March 29, 2007
COMMODORE GAMEDAY INFORMATION
Watch Friday and Sunday’s Games online at South Carolina’s web site (SUBSCRIPTION REQUIRED)
Friday, March 30 | Sunday, April 1
Gametracker Live Stats | Free Online Radio | View Game Notes | 560 AM
TENTATIVE WEEKEND SCHEDULE
No. 3 Vanderbilt (24-3, 3-3 SEC)
at No. 1 South Carolina (22-4, 4-2 SEC)
at Sarge Frye Field (6,000)
Friday, March 30 at 6 p.m. CT: Radio – 560 AM
David Price (5-0, 2.79 ERA) vs. Harris Honeycutt (6-0, 1.42)
Saturday, March 31 at 3 p.m. CT: TV – FSN, Radio – 560 AM
Mike Minor (3-0, 2.35 ERA) vs. Mike Cisco (2-1, 3.51)
Sunday, April 1 at 12:30 p.m. CT: Radio – 560 AM
Nick Christiani (5-1, 3.05 ERA) vs. Blake Cooper (3-0, 1.00)
Series History
vs. South Carolina: USC leads 38-12 all-time. VU has won five of the seven meetings over the last two years
Last Year
May 25, 2006 Vanderbilt 11, South Carolina 1 (7) Hoover, Ala.
May 20, 2006 South Carolina 6, Vanderbilt 3 Nashville
May 19, 2006 Vanderbilt 10, South Carolina 6 Nashville
May 18, 2006 Vanderbilt 8, South Carolina 7 Nashville
Polls
Vanderbilt is ranked No. 3 by Baseball America and the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Poll. VU is ranked No. 4 in the Sports Weekly/ESPN Coaches Poll and by Rivals.com. Collegiate Baseball ranked the Commodores No. 5 this week.
South Carolina is ranked No. 1 by Baseball America and Rivals.com, No. 2 by the NCBWA, No. 3 by Sports Weekly/ESPN and No. 4 by Collegiate Baseball.
All of the National Polls can be found on page 6 of the game notes.
The Coaches
VU’s Tim Corbin is 168-98 in his fifth season as head coach. He is 6-9 against South Carolina.
USC’s Ray Tanner is 476-204 in 11 years in Columbia and 871-377-3 in 20 years overall. He is 26-7 against Vanderbilt.
Radio/TV/Internet
All of the 2007 games can be heard free via the internet through Yahoo and can be accessed using the following web page: http://vucommodores.collegesports.com/sports/m-basebl/radio-tv-internet.html. In addition, the series will be broadcast locally in Nashville as well on WNSR 560 AM. Joe Fisher will call all of the action for the Commodores this weekend. Saturday’s contest will be broadcast regionally by Fox Sports Net. Dave Neal (play-by-play) and Larry Conley (analysis) will call the action.
The games on Friday and Sunday will be webcast on a pay basis through www.uscsports.com. Gametracker can be accessed through the vucommodores.com
What’s On Tap
For the second straight weekend Vanderbilt will hit the road against a Top 10 opponent, this time against No. 1 South Carolina in Columbia. The series starts on Friday at 6 p.m. and will continue on Saturday at 3 p.m. and on Sunday at 12:30 p.m. (All Times Central). Fox Sports Net will broadcast Saturday’s game regionally.
Scouting South Carolina
South Carolina is 22-4 overall and 4-2 in SEC play after taking two of three from Mississippi State over the weekend. The Gamecocks took care of Elon by a 10-6 count in midweek action on Tuesday.
Catcher Trent Kline leads the squad with a .392 batting average to go with four homers and 24 RBI, while first baseman Justin Smoak is the top power source with nine homers and 26 RBI. The Gamecocks are hitting .319 as a team with 44 homers and 231 runs scored in 25 games (9.2 runs per game).
SC will use an all righthanded rotation this weekend. Harris Honeycutt (6-0, 1.42 ERA) will take the hill on Friday, Mike Cisco (2-1, 3.51 ERA) on Saturday and Blake Cooper (3-0, 1.00 ERA) on Sunday.
Wynn Pelzer is the team’s relief ace with a 1.11 ERA and a save with 26 strikeouts and four walks in 11 appearances. As a team, South Carolina leads the SEC with a 2.54 ERA and 263 strikeouts in 237.2 innings pitched.
Commodore Tidbits
Vanderbilt lost its first series of the year on the road against Top 10 Arkansas last week … The Commodores lost their first one-run game of the season on Friday 8-7 in 10 innings. They were 8-0 in one-run games prior … Vanderbilt has come from behind in 14 of the 24 wins this year … VU rapped out a season high 22 hits in the win over Middle Tennessee on Wednesday … 91 of Vanderbilt’s 191 RBI this season have come with two outs … Dominic de la Osa went 7-for-17 (.412) with a homer and three RBI in four games last week. Three of his hits came in Sunday’s finale against Arkansas … Ryan Davis went 4-for-7 (.571) with a double and four RBI in three games, including a start against Western Kentucky … Ryan Flaherty has a six game hitting streak going into the week with Brad French carrying a five game one … Vanderbilt hit .299 as a team with three homers and 31 runs scored last week … Jason Cunningham, a team manager a year ago, made his first two career relief appearances last week and did not allow a run in 2.1 innings pitched. He got an out to close out the Western Kentucky game, then threw two innings of three hit relief against Arkansas on Sunday … Cameron Betourne made his first appearance of the year against WKU and threw a scoreless inning as did Josh Zeid in his second appearance of 2007 … Mike Minor struck out nine in five innings of relief work in two appearances on the week. He picked up his first SEC save against Arkansas on Saturday, allowing one run on one hit in 1.2 innings of action … Nick Christiani picked up his first career SEC win in his second conference start on Saturday. He made nine relief appearances last season as a freshman and lost in his first start last week against Ole Miss. He gave up two runs on five hits in 7.1 innings with three strikeouts and five walks in the 6-3 win over the Razorbacks on Saturday. The pitching staff had a 5.05 ERA in four games on the week 31 strikeouts and 19 walks in 35.2 innings … David Price had a string of five straight double-digit strikeout games snapped against Arkansas on Friday (Finished with eight). He also had a string of three straight complete games snapped as he went six innings against the Razorbacks … Brett Jacobson had his shortest stint this season with 1.1 innings against Arkansas on Sunday. It was also the shortest outing of any starter this year … The Commodores are in the midst of playing three of four SEC series on the road (at No. 9 Arkansas, at No. 2 South Carolina, home vs. No. 25 Alabama, at No. 11 Kentucky).
Commodores Drop From Top Spot, Face New No. 1
Vanderbilt dropped from the top spot for the first time in five weeks after losing two of three at No. 9 Arkansas last weekend.
The Commodores will face the new No. 1 South Carolina this weekend, marking the second time this season they will face a top rated squad (Rice in the season opener).
The Commodores at 24-3 are off to the best start in school history and the team’s 20-0 start was the best start of any sport at Vanderbilt. It bested the 17-0 start of the 1993 women’s basketball team.
When ranked No. 1 the baseball ranking joined women’s basketball and women’s golf as the only NCAA sports to achieve a No. 1 ranking at Vanderbilt. The 1993 women’s hoops squad was ranked No. 1 by the AP for six weeks, including the final regular season poll prior to postseason play. The women’s golf team was ranked No. 1 for a time in 2004.
Shea Robin Named To Johnny Bench Watch List
Junior catcher Shea Robin was named to the initial Johnny Bench Award List by The Greater Wichita Area Sports Commission.
Twenty-seven catchers from seventeen conferences were nominated for the award by their coaches. Because the award is given annually to the top division one collegiate catcher, the list will be updated to include other candidates until May 7, 2007.
Robin is one of four catchers from the Southeastern Conference to be on the list, joining Tennessee’s J.P. Arencibia, Mississippi State’s Edward Easley and LSU’s Robert Lara.
The Woodlands, Texas, native is hitting .314 on the season with a homer and 13 RBI. He has made only two errors on the season in 217 chances and has thrown out nine base runners as well. He is leading the team in hitting over the last 10 games, with a .387 batting average with seven RBI and nine runs scored.
The watch list will be narrowed down to ten semi-finalists, whom will be announced May 17, 2007.
Commodores Crush Middle Tennessee 14-2
Vanderbilt pounded out a season 22 hits en route to a 14-2 win over Middle Tennessee Wednesday evening at Hawkins Field.
Every Vanderbilt starter had at least one hit, with Pedro Alvarez leading the way with three hits and five RBI. Dominic de la Osa, Ryan Flaherty, Alex Feinberg, Brian Harris, Brad French and David Macias each had two hits in the winning cause.
The Blue Raiders jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first on a RBI single by Rawley Bishop and a RBI groundout by Zach Barrett off of starter Brett Jacobson. Vanderbilt stormed right back to take the lead with three runs in the bottom of the first. Dominic de la Osa led off with a double to right and scored on Pedro Alvarez’ mammoth homer to left to tie the game. Ryan Flaherty followed with a bunt single and stole second and third before scoring on a sacrifice fly by Andrew Giobbi to make it 3-2.
The Commodores loaded the bases in the second when Brian Harris and Brad French led off with back-to-back singles and David Macias was hit by a pitch. de la Osa and Alvarez followed with RBI groundouts to make it 5-2.
VU then blew the game open with six runs on seven hits in the bottom of the fifth. Andrew Giobbi, David Macias and Pedro Alvarez had RBI doubles, while Dominic de la Osa roped a RBI triple off the Green Monster wall in left to key the inning.
Alvarez added a RBI single in the seventh as did Carter Hawkins which was also his first hit of the year.
After the shaky first, Brett Jacobson (5-1) settled down and pitched four shutout innings. His final line was five innings, two runs, a walk and five strikeouts. Stephen Shao, Josh Zeid, Cameron Betourne and Casey Weathers each pitched a scoreless inning of relief.
Record Watch
Two Vanderbilt records worth watching this season are the school’s career strikeout mark and the career homer mark. With eight strikeouts against Arkansas last Friday, Price now has 312 in his career. He trails record holder Mike Willis by 38 strikeouts and second place Jeremy Sowers by one. With nine homers this year, Pedro Alvarez is now in 10th place with 31. He needs four homers to tie Greg Smith for ninth place on the all-time list with 35.
