You’ll be hard-pressed to find a better Cinderella sports story better than UC Santa Baseball this year.
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After UCSB (42-18-1) had loaded the bases with one out on a single from JJ Muno and back-to-back walks to Dempsey Grover and Billy Fredrick, Cohen connected on a 1-2 change-up from junior righthander Zack Burdi sending it over the right field wall for his second home run of the season. Up 1-0 in the best-of-three series against Louisville, down 3-0 in the game, with a golden ticket to Omaha waiting in the wings should the Gauchos pull this one out. James Carter (2.1 IP), Trevor Bettencourt (0.2 IP), and Kevin Chandler (0.2 IP) kept Louisville contained, allowing the Gauchos a chance to get back in the game.
No. 1 Florida staved off elimination in its best-of-three super regional, keeping the Southeastern Conference’s hopes of having at least one team make it to the CWS for a 24th straight year. Edgar Michelangeli hit a three-run homer and grand slam, with the second blast leading to a confrontation between the teams after Michelangeli flipped his bat at the start of his trot and there was an exchange of words between him and BC catcher Nick Sciortino.
The Aggies served as the visiting team in Saturday’s game and will be back as the home team on Sunday. Senior Danny Rosenbaum added two hits and drove in a run.
GAUCHO POWER: UC Santa Barbara swung the ball well in last week’s regional and hard especially in the clinching 14-5 win over Xavier. “I just let my practice and preparation take over”, Cohen said of his big hit.
Nelson picked up the save and secured victory for his team again in this postseason after pitching a ideal final two innings allowing no hits and no runs while striking out one batter.
Boston College’s Donovan Casey 2 for 5 with three RBIs.
Drew Harrington coming through with a masterful performance in his final game, pitching into the eighth inning after striking out 12 batters, giving up six hits, walking one batter and holding the visitors scoreless.
Yes sir. The Gauchos, who had never been to a Super Regional just swept the #2 Louisville Cardinals.
-Entering the ninth inning with a lead, Louisville had a streak of 186 consecutive victories.
South Carolina’s Marcus Mooney went 3 for 4.
J.B. Moss hit the first of his A&M’s four home runs on the second pitch of the game and Kyle Simonds pitched 7 2/3 strong innings in the Aggies’ 7-1 win over TCU.
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Burdi was selected 26 overall in the Major League Baseball draft this past week and must now weigh his options between signing with the Chicago White Sox or returning to Louisville next year.
