Sure, we still have a couple of months to go before the return of Tennessee baseball. However, with the departure of Tony Vitello to the MLB to manage the San Francisco Giants, it’s so dang hard not to spend at least a little bit of time every day thinking about Josh Elander’s first season on Rocky Top next year. Yes, the coaching staff is going to look a whole lot different next season with Vitello, Quentin Eberhardt, and Frank Anderson all off to the Bay Area. What isn’t going to look different is the roster the Vols were going to trot out in 2026 with or without Vitello – and it’s a roster that should be one of the best in the SEC once again.

Tennessee baseball fans have had an emotionally taxing last couple of months. It’s still mind-boggling to come to terms with the fact that the Vols lost their coach, who had won a national championship the previous season and built the best and coolest program on campus this century, to the professional ranks in what could be a trailblazing move for college baseball coaches everywhere. It’s going take time to get used to the post-Vitello world at Lindsey Nelson Stadium, that much is obvious. However, what will expedite the healing process is pretty straightforward – winning a lot of baseball games.

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Thankfully, the good folks at D1Baseball, Joe Healy in this particular case, wrote a preview piece on Tennessee’s 2026 outlook, and if by the end of it that doesn’t light your fire for Year 1 of the Elander era on Rocky Top, then your wood is likely wet.

New pitching coach Josh Reynolds has a great problem to have, where he has four fantastic options for three key spots in the weekend rotation with returnee Brandon Arvidson, Rutgers transfer Landon Mack, returnee Tegan Kuhns, and Virginia transfer Evan Blanco. The bullpen is loaded with high-upside transfers like former ETSU pitcher Brady Frederick, former Kennesaw State pitcher Bo Rhudy, and former Duke pitcher Mark Hindy, not to mention the return of talented right-hander Brayden Krenzel and the arrival of top-50 true freshman lefty Cameron Appenzeller.

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On the lineup side of things, you have the surprising but needed return of outfielder Reese Chapman. Jay Abernathy could be a breakout year-two player in center field and at the top of the lineup. Veterans Blake Grimmer and Virginia transfer Henry Ford could be key power bats in the middle of the order and play in the outfield or infield. Tennessee has never had this many intriguing options at catcher, and the Vols could have the best defensive 2B-SS combo in the SEC with Ariel Antigua and Manny Marin. If Levi Clark finds consistency and power at the plate throughout SEC play, he could be in line for a big-time Year 2 as well. Even at DH, Elander has a great problem with options like Rice transfer Blaine Brown, Walters State transfer Tyler Myatt, and Bowling Green transfer Garrett Wright, all figuring to battle for at-bats in the coveted DH role.

Sure, there are going to be some big-time battles for starting nods over the next couple of months. But when you take a peek under the hood at what Elander and his first staff have to work with in his first season as the head coach, it’s hard not to want to hop in your car, buy a ticket, and sit in quite frigid conditions for a February Tuesday night Tennessee against Georgia State ball game just like old times when Vitello was in charge.

I was pleased when Tennessee athletic director Danny White chose to promote from within and give Elander this much-deserved opportunity to keep the university’s best program humming. I’m even happier when I read pieces like Healy’s at D1Baseball. It’s baseball, so big-time success is not guaranteed with a big-time roster, but, man, that doesn’t mean if you’re Elander that you’re not fired up about how good your first team in Knoxville could be in 2026.

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I also host a very popular daily sports podcast called ‘The Chase Thomas Podcast’ that you should very much subscribe to here.

Harry Bosch is never going to change. The star of the Amazon Prime drama “Bosch” follows a LAPD detective with a strong love of jazz and chasing ghosts. He’s haunted from his past, but he understands that. He understands that part of what makes him such a gifted detective is who he is as a person. All the pieces, his rough childhood included, matter. He bends the rules, he keeps to himself, he maintains the ethos that “either everyone matters, or nobody matters” everyday.

He also gets results, which is why the department puts up with him. Harry Bosch is not for everybody, and he knows that. And yet, it doesn’t deter him from doing his job. He stays steadfast in who he is, which leads to some folks like his lieutenant who understand him and back and others, like the commissioner, who could not like him any less. Without the results, he is out of a job.

Tennessee baseball manager Tony Vitello reminds me of Bosch. His results are beginning to speak for themselves, both on the diamond and in recruiting, but he is not for everybody. When he revealed that he had learned that the Vols had a date with the Fighting Irish in the Super Regionals after a text from Peyton Manning, I’m certain some folks around the country rolled their eyes. When he chest-bumped an umpire in a game from the Alabama series, I’m certain folks around the country rolled their eyes. There may even be some Tennessee fans who were uneasy with the confident, brash, in-your-face style that the Volunteer baseball team played with this season. Those folks still rolled with it, though, because, the results spoke for themselves.

Vitello did just win Coach of the Year, after all.

It is not surprising that when Tennessee finally went down over the weekend in Knoxville against Notre Dame that a lot of folks danced on their graves. There was a clear disconnect between how Tennessee fans saw the team and most everybody else around the country. It was a moment that a lot of folks had hoped would happen. Even better for them, it happened before the Vols even made it to Omaha. “It couldn’t have happened to a better group of guys,” a lot folks said about a group of guys they knew nothing about.

Tennessee fans knew what they were up against as the No. 1 overall seed entering the tournament. Vitello was well aware of the fact that a No. 1 overall seed had not won the dang thing since ‘99 Miami. But that did not mean that Tennessee and Vitello needed to change who they were because of the road in front of them.

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Tennessee lost exactly one series in the regular season, and it came against a bad Kentucky team in Lexington. (They did get their revenge in the SEC Tournament in Hoover, though.) Vitello and company knew the Vols were the best college baseball team in the country, but that never meant they would be able to essentially remain perfect into late June.

One series loss the whole regular season. That’s tough-sledding, especially in the SEC.

The Vols never trailed in the SEC Tournament. There was an Auburn loss here, and a Georgia loss there, but the Vols played nearly perfect, dominant baseball until one weekend they didn’t.

Immediately, the response was that Tennessee got a piece of “humble pie” in their loss to Notre Dame. Every other SEC team in the Super Regionals advanced. Tennessee did not. Of course, Tennessee did not lose to Notre Dame because of their attitude and style-of-play. The “Daddy” hats were not responsible for starter Chase Burns maybe staying in a batter or two too long. The bravado did not zap their ability to push guys around the bases when they got on all weekend.

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Perhaps the most frustrating part of the “humble pie” crowd is that those same folks also subscribe to the “that’s baseball” idea. What happened in Tennessee over the weekend was as “that’s baseball” as it gets. One weekend, you just cannot knock in guys who are in scoring position. One weekend, your projected first-round starter can’t close up 0-2 in counts.

The conversation following Tennessee’s upset loss was that it was a referendum on Tennessee baseball, not that Tennessee had their first bad home weekend of baseball in the entire 2022 college baseball season.

Rocky Top Insider reported on how SEC Network’s Paul Finebaum characterized the Vols’ loss. He reportedly said on the airwaves this week on ‘The Paul Finebaum Show’, “Well, it happened on Rocky Top.” He continued, “Notre Dame came in there unheralded, the fourth-best team in the ACC, and beats not only the number one team in the tournament, but a team that many of the experts that you hear all the time, was possibly the best baseball team of all time. That ‘best baseball team of all time’ did not make it to the College World Series.”

Was 2021 Gonzaga not one of the best college basketball teams of all time because they came up just short in a 68-team tournament, or does the far larger body of work tell more of the story. Can Tennessee still be regarded as one of the best college baseball teams of all time, and also be a team that had a “that’s baseball” weekend at an inopportune time? Does it matter that the vast majority of folks who danced on Vitello’s rough loss fans of SEC teams who watched Tennessee run the SEC gauntlet both in the regular season and the SEC Tournament? It should, shouldn’t it?

He continued, “Tony V (Vitello) went a different direction.” Finebaum concluded, “Had he won, we all would’ve been saying that he’s unconventional, he’s brash, and he’s the best. He lost and he will pay for it. Listen, we don’t sugarcoat things here. He got his comeuppance [Sunday].”

Can folks not still be saying those things? Does one bad weekend outweigh what we all saw over the course of the 2022 college baseball season? Tony Vitello is still going to be unconventional, brash and one of the best managers in the sport. Why would he change after leading and building a Death Star of a college baseball team all season long? A loss on Sunday against Notre Dame should not overshadow two years of elite results on Rocky Top. Why should Vitello have to pay for being Vitello and dominating the sport for the majority of the year? 

For a lot of folks, Vitello is going to remain in a lose-lose situation. If the Vols ran the gauntlet, folks would have still ripped him and this program for winning the wrong way. Because the Vols lost their first home series in the middle of June, folks ripped him and this program for previously winning the wrong way. 

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LeBron James underwent a similar struggle in Miami over a decade ago. Because of “The Decision” and his decision to build a Big 3 with the Heat, folks were going to have their takes and they were going to have their narratives. When LeBron and company lost to Dallas in the 2011 Finals, it was similar to Vitello’s Vols in that it was a piece “humble pie” for LeBron and company. It was no such thing, of course, and they made it back again and again during LeBron’s Miami run with a couple of titles to show for it. It didn’t matter, though, because some folks had their mind made up about that Miami team like some folks have their mind made up about Vitello’s team.

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Tennessee brings back one of the best rotations in college baseball next season. The Vols are doing well in the transfer portal and in high-school recruiting and although a lot of familiar faces in the lineup will be gone, the ethos figures to remain on Rocky Top. The last two years for this program have been huge at Tennessee, and next year, Tennessee will likely not be the clear best team in the SEC, but they will be more like the 2021 team where they were one of the best.

That 2021 made it to Omaha. The 2022 team did not. That’s baseball, though, right?

With Vitello at the helm, Tennessee will continue to be in in the College World Series mix, and that’s all you can ask for as a fan, to be in the mix every year. Harry Bosch is Harry Bosch and Tony Vitello is Tony Vitello and they’re never going to change. If you’re a Tennessee fan or the LAPD, you can live with that because the results will come, even if sometimes they don’t come exactly when or how you want them to. They’re extremely good at what they do, and they do it their way, so you might as well let them be and trust the process.

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Chase Thomas is the Sports Renaissance Man, Atlanta Sports Guy and Vol For Life. He is a graduate student at the University of Tennessee and resides in Knoxville, TN. Chase obtained his undergraduate degree in journalism from the University of North Georgia. He has written for a variety of publications that include Outsider, SB Nation, VICE Sports, SI’s The Cauldron, Cox Media Group & ESPN’s TrueHoop Network. You can email him at chasethomaspodcast[at]gmail.

I also host a very popular daily sports podcast called ‘The Chase Thomas Podcast’ that you should very much subscribe to here.

It’s been a couple of days now since the Tennessee Volunteers were eliminated in the Super Regionals by Notre Dame. It was a result that certainly delighted a lot of folks who did not care for the way in which manager Tony Vitello’s group carried themselves during their all-time great season in Knoxville. Before I even began this piece, I saw a Twitter user revel in the fact that Tennessee turned out to be the only SEC school in the Super Regionals not to advance to the College World Series this year.

But then I closed my phone.

I closed my phone on Sunday afternoon, too. Losing was a bummer. Seeing the response to the loss to the Fighting Irish, especially by some folks with large platforms, was an even bigger one.

So I closed my phone again. I hopped in my car and I drove right to campus. I love to run, but I really love to run when I’m frustrated. There aren’t many things in this world quite like it. I ran all around campus, up the stairs to Ayres Hall, around Neyland Stadium, and somehow wound up at Gus’s Good Time Deli by the end.

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The frustrations evaporated.

In recent months, I’ve made the switch to running with nothing in my ears. No podcasts. No music. Just my thoughts as I race around Knoxville. Malcolm Gladwell swears by it, and I’m a fan, so I gave it a shot. I never looked back. He was right. It’s better. With no AirPods clogging up my eardrums, I find myself thinking about my plan for the day, for the week, for the month and sometimes even for the year as my feet hit cement block after cement block. On this Sunday afternoon, though, I was not thinking about anything of the sort.

I was just grateful.

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Sure, the end result over the weekend against Notre Dame is something no Tennessee fan wanted, but, man, what a year. What a ride it was. You can dwell on Vitello leaving Chase Burns in too long or you can simply move on. Winning is fun, and winning the way this Tennessee baseball team won is something I’ll never forget. I found myself feeling so grateful just thinking about how much fun I have had from football season to basketball season to baseball season in the past year. What a run it has been for Tennessee athletics as a whole.

I was fortunate enough to be in the building for so many Tennessee victories for all three of the major sports on campus throughout the last year it’s rather silly. It made me smile to just reflect on all the different moments of joy the Vols have brought me as both a graduate student and a fan over the last year.

Getting to experience it all, including Drew Gilbert’s charisma and bat flips in person was even better.

Timing is everything in life. It’s scary how much you notice it as you age. For me, the timing was just right in leaving Atlanta for Knoxville when I did. I maintain it’s the best decision I ever made. The timing of doing my undergraduate degree at the University of North Georgia before earning my graduate degree at the University of Tennessee was perfect. I was not ready for a big school then, like I was ready for a big school now. I met the woman I’m going to marry this fall here, but I met her at the right time for me and the right time for her.

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Timing is everything.

As I continued running around campus, I thought about the future. Tennessee baseball is in a great place and only going to get better. Even if the Vols take a slight step back next season without Gilbert, Beck, Lipscomb, Russell and Lipcius, the Super Regionals showed that maybe just being one of the best teams in the conference is the better path to Omaha in 2023 than being the best team in the conference. Tennessee basketball is in a great place and only going to get better. Tennessee football is in a great place and only going to get better.

Listeners of the podcast know that I often joke about the fact that Tennessee is, in fact, an “Everything School” at the moment. I really do feel that way, though. Athletic Director Danny White has this thing humming all across the board.

It would have been nice to make it to Omaha. It would have been nice to see the Vols finish it out and cement themselves as maybe the best college baseball team of all time. It would have been just awesome for Vitello and his guys. However, as I ran past Stokely Hall I thought about this team and the men’s basketball team both winning the SEC Tournament in the same year, making history in the process. I have watched a lot more victories on Rocky Top this season than losses.

I’m grateful for that.

Sports are still, at their core, an escape for us. Tennessee baseball was an unbelievable escape for so many Tennessee folks this spring. Being there in person so often, and not in the press box, there was nothing like it. Fans had a good time. Often. Kids became Mike Honcho superfans. I saw how a fanbase and program had Evan Russell’s back when he needed it most, like they had Zakai Zeigler and his family’s back a few months prior, and I saw a team that played the game in a way that made Friday nights and Sunday afternoons in Knoxville electric all season long.

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I’m not sure if Tennessee baseball will ever field a team this dominant ever again. I’m certain a lot of folks around the SEC are pulling for that to be the case. Tennessee baseball was not for everybody this season, but that’s OK. They did not ever pretend to be. They were who they were, and that’s part of what made folks on Rocky Top buy in so much last season and even more so this season. They won a lot of stinkin’ games by a lot of stinkin’ runs while hitting a lot of stinkin’ homers doing it their way. Like Drew Gilbert’s walk-up song said all year, the BaseVols wanted it that way.

As I walked back to my car, I looked over at Neyland. I thought about football season being up next, but I also thought about how fortunate I was to be here in Knoxville, both cheering on the Vols both as a student and a fan. I had the privilege of seeing one of the most dominant college baseball teams ever assembled up close and in person more times than I could count this season.

Omaha or no Omaha, I will look back at this year’s team years later and smile. They were a collection of superstar players and superstar personalities you won’t ever forget. Drew Gilbert, Trey Lipscomb, Chase Dollander, Jordan Beck, you name ‘em. I saw ‘em.

And, boy, am I grateful I did.

Go Vols.

I feared this day would come. The day in which the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets faced the Tennessee Volunteers in the Knoxville Regionals this weekend. As I’m writing this, the Jackets are up big on Campbell in their elimination game, and, barring a miracle, Georgia Tech will face Tennessee later this evening in the regional final.

I did not want this to be the case.

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When the regional bracket was revealed last week and I saw Tech in Tennessee’s bracket my heart immediately sank. I thought about Papa. I thought about how perfect it would have been for him and my family to come up for the weekend and watch the games. I thought about just how cruel timing can be in life sometimes. The first college baseball postseason without Papa, the Vols get the Jackets in their regional.

It is uncomfortable for me to even write this.

In a previous piece, I wrote at length about the kind of relationship I had with Papa. I wrote about Georgia Tech baseball and how much I treasured our time, just the two of us together, catching so many games growing up in Atlanta. It was one of my favorite things as a kid.

A former pastor read the piece at Papa’s funeral this spring.

At the start of each college baseball season, I think of him, and I think of the games, and I think of the view at Tech and that Atlanta skyline in the outfield and I think about the solitude. We both were always just fine keeping to ourselves and watching the game. The best part was simply being there, enjoying the game and, really, watching the world go by.

What you do not think about in those moments, though, is that one of those times would be the last. That the world really does go by. One day, you’re in your thirties, engaged and wrapping up graduate school in a completely different state.

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After I moved to Knoxville, we still spoke often. I always wanted him and Nanny to come up for a Tennessee baseball game with my family. Even if they were not playing Tech, that didn’t matter. I missed watching baseball with Papa. It didn’t sit right with me knowing the years were passing and things changed. It’s part of life, I get that, but I do not have to like it, though.

However, in the back of mind, I thought it would eventually happen. I thought he and Nanny would eventually make their way up here with my parents and we’d have the opportunity to go watch the best team in the country together. In my mind, it was happening, even if it had not yet been decided.

But it did not work out that way.

Tonight, Tennessee will need to beat Tech to advance to the Super Regionals. It’s already not sitting right with me writing this piece. I know I’m going to think about Papa a lot and our experiences together. I’m going to think about how perfect it would have been to have him up here for this game.

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I miss my Papa, and I always will, but tonight, it’s going to be different. Tonight, I’m going to think less about the Vols and more about what could have been.

I’m going to think about Papa.

It would have been so perfect, all of it, and yet, it all came together at the worst possible time. I’ll think about how much I wish this regional happened last year. It feels so wrong for it all to unfold this way at this time. Tonight is going to be hard, but I’m glad that’s the case because if that was not the case than our relationship wasn’t what it could have been. It’s going to be hard because of the memories, because of the times we had and because we did it all right. And yet, Tech playing Tennessee this weekend feels oh so wrong.

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Chase Thomas is the Sports Renaissance Man, Atlanta Sports Guy and Vol For Life. He is a graduate student at the University of Tennessee and resides in Knoxville, TN. Chase obtained his undergraduate degree in journalism from the University of North Georgia. He has written for a variety of publications that include Outsider, SB Nation, VICE Sports, SI’s The Cauldron, Cox Media Group & ESPN’s TrueHoop Network. You can email him at chasethomaspodcast[at]gmail.

I also host a very popular daily sports podcast called ‘The Chase Thomas Podcast’ that you should very much subscribe to here.

You made it. Yes, you, the diehard Tennessee Volunteer fan who stayed awake just long enough to watch Redmond Walsh tie Todd Helton’s record in career saves on Rocky Top. The time? Around 2:30 A.M. If you’re local. But, hey, weather delays be damned, you stayed up to watch the Vols capture their 51st victory on the season. Granted, you might be thinking about a cheeseburger from Litton’s or some lobster fettuccine alfredo from Savelli’s thanks to the great Tom Hart on the SEC Network broadcast, but the point remains, you made it and no LSU fan hustling up and down the aisle in Hoover with the “K” card can change that.

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The Tennessee Volunteers move to the semifinals without a blemish, along with the No. 2 seed in Texas A&M. Now, they’ll wait for the winner of LSU vs. Kentucky and have to lose back-to-back games to avoid qualifying for Championship Sunday. The same is true for the Aggies. It seems like the two charismatic, confident clubs with gigantic fanbases and college football stadiums are on a collision course with one another. A few months ago, the thought was that a date with the Arkansas Razorbacks would be all the rage come late May. Instead, it’s a date with the white hot Texas A&M Aggies. 

That is, of course, if both teams take care of business on Saturday in Hoover.

There was a moment on Friday night that warmed the hearts of every Tennessee fan watching both in the stands and at home. It came after starting pitcher Chase Dollander through his last pitch, pitch No. 99 on the evening. The broadcasters wondered aloud if this was indeed it for the Vols’ ace, and, in fact, it was. Dollander was smiling from ear to ear, along with all of his teammates in the top of the seventh inning. There were two outs in the inning and nobody aboard. However, it was time, and after, nine Ks and another big-time performance against one the most potent offenses in the SEC, Dollander exited the mound to a round of applause from the Volunteer fans in attendance. It was nice, and you forgot how close things were for LSU to really flipping the script on Dollander. (An unreal snag from Jordan Beck out in right, for instance.) However, manager Tony Vitello pulled Dollander up 5-2, a score that would hold for the remainder of the evening. Cut to the next Peyton Manning financial commercial.

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There were two different plays early that perfectly incapsulate what makes Jordan Beck a special ball player. In the bottom of the first, it was Beck who ripped a deep liner to right field to score Luc Lipcius from first and give Beck a triple to put the Vols up 1-0. In the the top of the second inning, just after his RBI triple, Beck bailed his ace out with a ridiculous sliding grab down the foul line in right to make the third out and prevent two runs from scoring and giving the Tigers a 2-1 lead and all the momentum. Sometimes, when a special talent like Beck slips into a hitting slump, you take them for granted. His early heroics reminded folks why you should never do so.

But, goodness, what an evening for Chase Dollander, huh? 99 pitches and nine strikeouts. The man could not escape the number nine Friday night. This evening had it all for Dollander, though. He kicked things off with three-straight strikeouts, found himself in a couple jams, and had no interest in ever falling behind in the count. The kid just does not get rattled. There was a moment where that was a possibility, after a rare errant throw from shortstop Cortland Lawson that bounced up on him the wrong way and he airmailed his throw to Luc over on first. However, with the Vols up just 3-2 after the event, Chase forced a pop up to left field for Seth Stephenson and struck out the next hitter to end the ending and the danger.

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The Vols have not blown a game in which they went up three runs this season. Friday night was no different. The Vols never looked back after the damage they did in the bottom of the fifth frame. With his pitchcount high, you wondered why LSU manager Jay Johnson left his starter in the game to try and get through the heart of Tennessee’s order again. Once Drew Gilbert saw red once again on a strike-three call early in the game that he did not agree with you knew it was only a matter of time before he knocked in another Vol, and he did in that frame to put the Vols up 4-2. Jorel Ortega added another insurance run with a shot down the leftfield line to give the Vols their final run on the evening. Now, the chase is on for the Vols to meet the Aggies on Sunday. Kentucky or LSU, once again, awaits.

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Chase Thomas is the Sports Renaissance Man, Atlanta Sports Guy and Vol For Life. He is a graduate student at the University of Tennessee and resides in Knoxville, TN. Chase also obtained his undergraduate degree in journalism from the University of North Georgia. He has written for a variety of publications that include Outsider, SB Nation, VICE Sports, SI’s The Cauldron, Cox Media Group & ESPN’s TrueHoop Network. You can email him at chasethomaspodcast[at]gmail.

It finally happened. The Tennessee Volunteers baseball team finally took the field in Hoover to begin their quest of winning the SEC Tournament. It may have taken a bit to get here, but there is no doubt about it – the Vols are here. The Vols were supposed to face off with the Vanderbilt Commodores long before the game actually took place around 7:00 PM EST on Thursday evening. Because of that, fans and analysts alike had time to think about things, and, potentially, overthink things. With the delay in play, it was fair to wonder what the Vols would like when they finally found their way onto the baseball diamond and played ball. If you talk to a lot of folks in the game, one of the first things you’ll learn is how routine-oriented so many guys are. They’re not all superstitious, but they are a little stitious, you know?

Well, if you were wondering if we would see the Tennessee baseball team that we have come to expect all season long on Thursday night, the Vols cleared that up real quick. Not even a rogue whistler could have prevented the Commodores from taking another loss at the hands of the BaseVols. For those keeping score at home, last year’s College World Series finalists are 0-4 against Tennessee in 2022.

It was not like Mississippi State, another 2021 juggernaut in college baseball, where the game ended in the top of the first inning. However, Tennessee made sure folks who needed to get up for work early on Friday ahead of the holiday weekend were able to get to bed maybe a bit earlier than they had anticipated.

It’ll be Chase Dollander, the ace of the staff this season, on the mound against LSU on Friday night. However, on Thursday night it was Blade Tidwell. He is still not quite back to who he was in 2021. Still, he only gave up one run over 4 and a third innings. The highlight was the top of third for Blade. With one out in the inning, the home plate umpire missed an obvious strike-three call. Then missed another. This led to a walk for Vandy and Vandy posing a serious threat with runners on first and third with one out. However, Blade got out of the inning with a strikeout and the Vols kept their one-run lead. (Note: Frank Anderson also had some thoughts on the home-plate umpire losing track of what is and what is not a strike. The umpire preferred that he cut it out.) 

Speaking of the third inning, the North never forgets and the Tennessee Volunteers never forgets. That’s right, as the bottom of the third is when things got ugly in a hurry. The Vols added five runs in the bottom of the third inning to blow the game open at 6-0. To begin this inning, Trey Lipsomb took a questionable HBP, Jorel Ortega smashed an RBI double, and Christian Moore yielded a double and an RBI off a crazy error. And just like that the Vols buried the Commodores.

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How do we feel about Mad Drew Gilbert? When you’re dealing with a cleanup hitter batting close to .400 you usually want to tread lightly. Instead, in the bottom of the sixth inning Gilbert, after already knocking in two runs on the evening, was rung up by the homeplate umpire on a ball that was so low and away folks in in Hoover waiting in line at the concessions were stunned. Gilbert was heated, and remained heated in the dugout. It should be noted this team was up 8-1 at this point, but this team’s intensity remains the same throughout. It’s not the biggest reason the team is No. 1 in the country, but it is one of them.

On the defensive side, Trey Lipsomb and Evan Russell shined bright at different moments. The former, pulled off a one-handed toss to first that you only expect to see in an “Angels in the Outfield” remake. And yet, Lipsomb with the bases loaded in the top of sixth inning bare-handed a bloop to third with ease and hit Luc Lipcius right on the money at first to end the inning and avoid any momentum for Vanderbilt. In the top of the fourth, though, Russell flashed some defensive skills gunning down a Vandy runner who tried to steal second base. Russell placed the ball exactly where it needed to be for Ortega. From the get-go, Vanderbilt had to chase to Tennessee. By the third inning, it was clear they would not catch them.

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Give credit where credit is due, as the No. 19 Auburn Tigers pushed the Vols like no other SEC team has this season over the course of their three-game series. Each game told a different story. On Friday, the Vols humiliated the Tigers. On Saturday, the Tigers stunned the Vols late. On Sunday, the Vols survived the Tigers late. (Naturally, I was in attendance for the Vols’ lone loss in the series on Saturday night.)

This series was extremely competitive, and the Tigers proved they are going to be a dangerous team the rest of the way. Twenty-four hours after the affair, folks are still talking about the back-and-forth between the two sides. There are differing perspectives on who said what and to who. If you’re an Auburn fan, how the Vols do business probably rubs you the wrong way. If you’re a Tennessee fan, how the Tigers do business probably rubs you the wrong way. There are so many different ways you can attack the day, but spending any time arguing online about the nature or ethos of either team is not in your best interest. Especially if you’re a Volunteer, it does not matter. What matters is the victory and what matters is getting back to the College World Series.

Let’s cut to the part where Joseph Gonzalez exited the game. I don’t know what happened to the Auburn ace in that first inning, but after giving up three runs, including a two-run dinger from Trey Lipscomb to the top of the Vols’ order, Gonzalez got the train back on track and rolled for what almost ended up being the rest of the dang game. We knew coming in this match-up was going to be all about Drew Beam vs. Gonzalez, and it was the latter that stole the show. For two hours, at least. After that first-inning blip, Gonzalez did not allow a hit until he gave up a single to Drew Gilbert in the bottom of the sixth. He did not give up another run until Jordan Beck had enough in the bottom of the eighth inning. Gonzalez did everything he could to get the Tigers over the hump, but as so many other teams have learned in 2022, you can only expect to get through the meat of the Tennessee batting order so many times before all hell breaks loose.

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I can only imagine how tense folks were going into the bottom of the eighth at Lindsey Nelson Stadium. On Saturday night, my feet hurt, my back hurt, and good Lord did my right knee hurt. It was a standing-room-only affair, but I wouldn’t have had it any other way. When you’re standing as close to home plate as the Sports Renaissance Woman and myself were, you feel the stress of every other fan around you. It’s one of those things that makes sports games so great to attend in the first place. Sure, that three-run homer by the Tigers in the top of the ninth was deflating as all get out. However, I can only imagine what the inverse was like on Sunday afternoon after that two-run homer by Mike Honcho. I wrote in my notes that I was surprised to see Auburn allow Gonzalez to try and get through the heart of Tennessee’s lineup one more time, but boy am I glad Buck Thompson did. Beck gave all the diehards in that stadium one of the best moments of the season with that blast to left field.

Ben Joyce, not Drew Beam, turned out to be the Vol to watch on Sunday. He came in for Beam in the top of the sixth inning and he just never left. Auburn fans felt what Ximena felt on 90 Day Fiance: Before The 90 Days, when Mike returned back to Columbia for a second time. They just wanted Ben Joyce to leave. However, Joyce had other plans and elected to smash an SEC record with a fastball that reached 105.5 mph. Absolute filth from Joyce. However, Tony Vitello did not throw Joyce in there to get out of the sixth-inning jam. He kept rolling with him. He never took him out because Joyce never gave him a reason to. Joyce registered six strikeouts and gave up one hit over four innings.

Beam did not have the outing that he certainly wanted, but he was solid and his Sunday afternoon could have fared a lot worse, just look at what his teammate Blade Tidwell worked through on Saturday night. However, the afternoon turned less into the match-up between the starters and more into the match-up between Gonzalez and Joyce. You had no idea which star on the mound was going blink first and give up the run to break that 3-3 tie. Thankfully for the Vols, it was Auburn who found themselves having to chase Tennessee at the top of the ninth inning for back-to-back days of comebacks against the best team in college baseball. That did not happen and the Vols won the series 2-1.

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Chase Thomas is “The Sports Renaissance Man”, “Atlanta Sports Guy” and Vol For Life. He is a graduate student at the University of Tennessee and resides in Knoxville, TN. Chase also obtained his undergraduate degree in journalism from the University of North Georgia. He has written for a variety of publications that include Outsider, SB Nation, VICE Sports, SI’s The Cauldron, Cox Media Group & ESPN’s TrueHoop Network. You can email him at chasethomaspodcast[at]gmail.

That’s what happened on Tuesday night in Knoxville, TN., between the Tennessee Volunteers and the Xavier Musketeers. Xavier came into the night just trying to keep their head above water, or, in their case, their team above the .500 mark late into the 2022 college baseball season. Xavier still has a lot to play for in the Big East down the stretch here, but this Tuesday affair felt like one of those contests where both sides were thinking about tomorrow.

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God bless Zander Sechrist. The man wanted to get to the Auburn series this weekend just as much as the rest of us. Sechrist threw four pitches to get three outs in the top of the first inning Tuesday night at Lindsey Nelson Stadium. The Tuesday Night Man had somewhere to be as he hustled off the mound after each quick frame on the mound. The man always darts off the mound back into the dugout after getting through each inning. This was not what Xavier had in mind, though, seven different pitchers in a game where the Musketeers lost 10-1.

Part of the reason Tennessee baseball games can drag a bit is for good reason – it is really hard for opposing pitchers to put the Vols down, especially if they have two outs in the inning. This game was different, though, as the Vols had 7 runs on four hits at one point in this game. As of this writing, I think Luc Lipcius just got awarded another walk. The countless pitching changes on Tuesday night via the Musketeers was, well, a lot, and I imagine a lot of you folks who tuned in Tuesday night in Vol Nation would have preferred if they would have cut that out.

Tennessee homered in this one, too, which was a surprise, to, well, nobody. With the two-run dinger to left via shortstop Cortland Lawson, the Vols have now hit a home run in eight-straight contests. Speaking of Lawson, he was everywhere on the evening. He had that two-run dinger to put the Vols up a healthy 3-0, but he also was responsible for Sechrist losing his no-no bid in the top of the fourth with a weird grounder that led to an infield single. He bounced back, though, with another RBI in the form of a sacrifice fly to put the Vols up 4-0 in the bottom of the fourth. The meat of the order struggled early in this one, with Jordan Beck, Drew Gilbert, and Trey Lipscomb, but it was Lawson in that eighth spot who came to the rescue.

The Everybody Walks Luc phenomenon is a fascinating one. On Tuesday night, the Musketeers were missing everywhere with the Vols’ first baseman at the plate. He leads the team in walks and it’s not particularly close. After adding another to kick things off in the second inning, it was revealed he had 43 to that point with the next closest on the team still finding themselves in the 20s. Luc also had some fun on second base later on in the game as one of the 37 pitchers featured Tuesday night really wanted to pick off the 1B for whatever reason.

I would love to know what hitters who are tasked with putting bat-on-ball against Ben Joyce think when they come up to the plate. Joyce was the first reliever inserted into the game on Tuesday night by manager Tony Vitello, and to watch as hitters chase his electric fastball wherever it ends up is never not a marvel. You can feel the energy of the crowd shift when Joyce enters the game and that first sound of his fastball about ripping a hole through the catcher’s mitt. Everyone’s eyes immediately turn to the radar gun to see what triple-digit number that strike was. Joyce came in with a runner on first and one out. He struck both batters out and the flamethrower’s watch had ended.

The Auburn Tigers are up next for the Vols are on Friday night at Lindsey Nelson Stadium. Let’s ride.

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