May 28, 2007
Recap: Vanderbilt 7 Arkansas 4
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Vanderbilt Adds to Championship Pedigree
Post-Game Column By Will Matthews
HOOVER, Ala. – Vanderbilt Head Coach Tim Corbin’s mantra heading into this week’s Southeastern Conference Tournament was that you learn to win tournaments by winning tournaments.
If Corbin knows what he is talking about – and after leading the team that this week became the first since 1996 to win both the SEC’s regular season and tournament titles in the same year you have to think he indeed knows a thing or two on the topic – then his No.1-ranked Commodores are well positioned for their next postseason challenge.
For as much as Vanderbilt accomplished this week in winning its first SEC Tournament since 1980 and becoming just the third team ever to do so after losing its first game, it emerged from the dugout after the final out had been recorded in its 7-4 win over Arkansas and greeted each other as if it had done nothing more than win a mid-week regular season game.
“You could tell after today’s game after winning the championship, it was kind of business as usual,” Corbin said. “We shook hands and we said, `Okay, we’ve got one down now let’s go for the next one.’ And really as a coach that is exactly what I want to see.”
This is, after all, a Corbin-cached team, and in Corbin’s world there is no time to stop and reflect on what has been when there are still goals out on the horizon to achieve.
“It feels great to win a tournament of this caliber,” said Vanderbilt third baseman Pedro Alvarez, who was named the tournament’s Most Valuable Player after hitting .540 in the Commodores’ six games and belting two home runs and driving in eight runs. “But it is just one game and we still have a lot of season still to play.”
The rest of the season will start Friday in the NCAA regionals, and Vanderbilt – for the first time in the program’s history – will get to host and play at home at Hawkins Field. The entire NCAA Tournament field will announced Monday at 11:30 a.m. CDT on ESPN.
“That will give us a lot of momentum going in,” said left fielder Matt Meingasner, who collected two hits and an RBI Sunday and also made the defensive play of the game when he gunned down Arkansas’ Matt Willard at the plate in bottom of the eighth inning. “We like playing in front of the home crowd. I think everybody does. We had a tough time going into Georgia Tech last year, so to host and to give those fans in Nashville something to cheer for is a great feeling.”
While Corbin might not want to spend much time celebrating his team’s accomplishment’s there is little debating that what Vanderbilt did this week in rallying from an opening game loss to Tennessee to become the first team in SEC history to run off five consecutive wins in the tournament bodes very well for its future.
The Commodores exhibited the kind of resiliency that so often is a trademark of championship-caliber teams and, perhaps more importantly, the kind of pitching depth that is so crucial to a team’s chances for having postseason success. Vanderbilt received strong outings from All-American David Price and freshman Mike Minor in wins against Mississippi State and Tennessee, something the team has come to expect during the course of the year. But the Commodores also proved they have at least nine reliable arms in compiling a 3.57 team ERA during the tournament.
“This is quite a feat by the kids and I am so proud of them,” said Vanderbilt Head Coach Tim Corbin. “I told them that before we even took the bus over here to play. I just explained to them how much I thought of them and what their make-up is all about. It takes a special make-up to do what we did, coming back like we did. We had a lot of unlikely heroes.”
If nothing else, the Commodores will lug with it back to Nashville – in addition, of course, to the two championship trophies SEC Commissioner Mike Slive presented them with this week – a ton of confidence and momentum, the kinds of intangibles that cannot be understated for a team preparing to embark on its most important stretch of the season.
“Coach talked about it all week,” said junior Tyler Rhoden, who earned the win Sunday by pitching 6.2 innings and allowing four runs on seven hits while striking out six and walking only two. “The best way to practice for a regional and a super regional and so on is to win tournaments. The more games that you play and the more wins that you can get under your belt, the more confidence you are going to have.”
Will Matthews spent three years as an investigative reporter with the Los Angeles Newspaper Group in Southern California. He earned his Master of Divinity degree in 2007 from Vanderbilt Divinity School. To email Will your feedback, Click Here
