March 3, 2016
VANDERBILT RE-VU
Vanderbilt finished off the sweep of UIC with a 20-8 win on Sunday. The team pounded out 20 hits with 15 players contributing at least one hit. The Commodores clinched the team’s second straight series, surviving UIC in 14 winnings to win 6-5. Bryan Reynolds picked up three hits, including his second homer, in the win. Vanderbilt posted the team’s first shutout of the season with a 9-0 win over UIC on Friday night. Jordan Sheffield tossed a career-best seven scoreless innings to go along with his career-high 11 strikeouts. The Commodores toppled Eastern Illinois 9-1 on Wednesday. Patrick Raby carried a no hitter into the seventh inning before allowing an infield single with one out, striking out 11 in his first career start and win. Vanderbilt won a rain-shortened, five inning game against UT Martin Tuesday 11-6. Chandler Day picked up the win in his collegiate debut with four innings of work and six strikeouts.
ON THE BUMP
Thursday, March 3
RHP Jordan Sheffield (2-0, 0-75) vs. RHP Tristan Beck (1-1, 2.89)
Saturday, March 5
TBA vs. TBA
Sunday, March 6
TBA vs. TBA
FRIDAY GAME MOVED TO THURSDAY
Due to the threat of rain in the Bay Area on Friday, the first game of the weekend series at Stanford has been moved up to Thursday at 5 p.m. CT. The Commodores and Cardinal will try to play the rest of the series as scheduled on Saturday and Sunday.
COUNTER PUNCH
The Commodores have packed an incredible counter punch through the team’s first eight games of the season. Excluding the ninth inning, Vanderbilt has countered with at least one run in the bottom half of the inning when allowing a run in the top half of the frame in eight of the 11 innings. Opponents have edged the Vandy Boys 29-27 in innings in which the opponent has scored while VU has outscored opponents in all other innings 66-0 to own a run differential of plus-62. The Commodores have answered all big innings (three-plus runs) with big innings of their own trailing by a single run 20-19 overall.
OFFENSE ROLLING EARLY AND OFTEN
The Vanderbilt offense has been impressive in the team’s first eight games despite losing three starters in the lineup that accounted for 273 hits last season. The Dores have scored a nation-leading 93 runs while averaging 11.6 runs per game for the eighth most runs per game in the nation. The Commodores have scored 10-plus runs four times already this season, a number last year’s team did not reach until the 11th game of the season. The offense has been especially dangerous early in games scoring 58 runs in the first four innings of games, including 21 in the third inning alone. More than half of the team’s runs (62.4%) have come in the first half of games. VU has scored first in six of eight contests, including four games that saw a Vandy run cross the plate in the opening frame. The offense’s 101 hits rank fourth in the nation with the team’s on-base percentage (.461) checking in at sixth-best in America.
YOU GET A HIT… AND YOU GET A HIT… EVERYONE GETS A HIT!
All 18 position players on the Vanderbilt roster now have at least one hit this season. An incredible 15 different Dores posted hits in Sunday’s win over UIC. Bryan Reynolds led the way last week with 11 hits followed by Ro Coleman’s eight and Jeren Kendall’s seven. Reynolds posted three straight, three-hit games and also drove in a team-high nine runs. In the team’s first eight games, 11 Commodores have already recorded multi-hit games led by Kendall, who has five.
GOOD START
Vanderbilt is off to its best start since 2007 when the Commodores – led by David Price – started an amazing 19-0. The Dores ascended to the top spot in the polls for the first time in program history that year. VU started 12-0 in 2005 joining 2007 as the only two Vandy teams under head coach Tim Corbin to post better starts than the current squad.