Vanderbilt-Lipscomb Postgame Quotes

May 29, 2015

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Vanderbilt-Lipscomb Postgame Quotes 

Vanderbilt coach Tim Corbin

Opening Statement:

“I know the score was 9-1 but it didn’t feel that way. It felt like a very highly contested game, which I thought it was. We had the one inning that broke open, but we beat a good team. We beat a very scrappy team. In order for us to get any momentum, we had to stop theirs and I thought Carson did a really good job with that. He gave up the leadoff walk in the fourth, but he pitched extremely well after that. It’s not a surprise. It’s kind of what he’s done most of the year. Once he gets going, he’s tough to score against. Jeren obviously had a great night and put us on the scoreboard early and had a great at-bat after we had an inning breakdown with the bases loaded. I thought his head was big and wanted to get momentum back and broke the game open. Ro had a heck of a night. Ro getting on base as much as he did and Wiseman behind him.

On the first game:

“I was thinking our Xavier game last year started that way, we didn’t really score early and broke the game open later. I do think first games of tournaments are very difficult just because of a lot of different things, but that’s what makes a starting pitching performance so valuable, just to contain the game so it gives the offense a chance to catch up.”

On the bottom half of the order:

“It’s a huge lift because guys like Wiseman and Dansby and Zander they get pitched hard and well so a lot of times what will happen is those guys will reach base and they have to get picked up by the bottom of the order. A lot of young kids picked us up tonight. Toffey, Reynolds had a great night and after that we had some great bats at the bottom too.”

On daunting task of pitching to Ro Coleman at leadoff:

“It’s daunting from several levels really. The fact he’s either side — right-handed, left-handed — so it never looks like you have a clear advantage. He throws the bunt game at you and then hits the ball hard the opposite way then hits the ball to the pull side, then he gets hit by a pitch. There was a wide array of offense from him and it allows Rhett to go behind him and use the hole if he has to and hit. Those nights aren’t easy to come by and the fact he got on base five times really helped our ball club.”

On pulling Fulmer:

“I think it was more about the length of the innings towards the end and he had to work hard to get through that game. The seventh inning lasted a little bit longer… and certainly a guy like (Collin) Snider can go in there and pitch well and tie the game down.”

On Reynolds getting out of a skid:

“It’s mental confidence more than anything else. He was a kid hitting at the top of the SEC for such a long period of time at the beginning of the year and the skid kept moving. I know how daunting that is for an offensive player, but I just think he had some great at bats at the SEC and I think it’s carried over to this particular Regional.”

On Indiana:

“I’ve seen them on tape, but I’d lie to you if I knew a whole lot about them because I try to stay contained in the team that we’re playing. We don’t have 24 hours, but we’ve got about 15 to look them over, but they’ve got a lot of kids off that College World Series team from a couple of years ago so they’re veteran in some spots but they’re throwing a kid with a good arm tomorrow so we’re just going to have to continue to pitch well.” 

Vanderbilt pitcher Carson Fulmer

On his performance after giving up the early run in the third:

“It’s something we obviously talk about a lot as a staff — just being able to compete still. Some things may not work out at that time, but you stick it back on the rubber and try to compete. I feel like we had the momentum on our side the whole time tonight.”

On building strength as the game progresses:

“I feel like sometimes I try to be too perfect and try to make the perfect pitch. To be able to throw all three of my pitches in the strike zone is the biggest thing for me. I feel like later on in the game, I was able to do that. That just worked out the way it did.”

Vanderbilt left fielder Jeren Kendall
On facing Martinez-McGraw’s knuckleball and what he saw on his home run:
“No, I actually haven’t seen (the knuckleball) before. But we kept doing the same approach as we did before. We’re not just looking for one pitch. We’re reacting to everything else. The home run was nice to start off the game for the team and we just kind of took it away there after Carson did a nice job there on the mound.”

Lipscomb Head Coach Jeff Forehand

Opening Statement:
“Well, you look at that game and you know when you’re playing a team like that the best thing you can do is do what we did for the first four innings. We had a good situation where we were right there. We had the game you know at reach, and we had a tough fifth inning. You know, looking at it as we came down here you know we go four hits and four freebies. What we call freebies is a hit by, two hit batters and a walk, and we go seven out of eight hitters that are on base. You know that puts you in a tough situation and anytime you give a team like that five runs in one inning you are going to put yourself in a tough spot especially with the guy they have on the mound who was doing such a good job.”

On if he thought his team played with any “nerves”:
“No I really didn’t. I don’t really. I didn’t really watch it. I didn’t watch for it, but I think we just tried to handle this. We’ve been on the road the last three weeks so our last conference series was on the road, and you know obviously we just got back from the tournament in Florida and we just tried to make it the same all year. Try to keep the same routine that we did, and actually we did that today. I don’t think I saw any nerves or anything like that. In this kind of game the atmosphere and the energy is obviously little bit higher. I can’t say that there wasn’t any anxiousness, I’m sure there was, but I didn’t really see us go out there and play timid. The guy gave up a tough pitch you know and I believe it was (Jeren) Kendall hit the homer. Like I said, he hit a good pitch a cutter that just didn’t cut in enough and get on his hands. He made a good swing and hit it out of the park. I loved how we reacted after that. You know, we came back and Adam gets the big base hit…We had something good going right there, and were able to stop it and that is the sign of a good team. To answer your question no I don’t think we were nervous at all.”

On if this was a revenge game for Vanderbilt:
“You know not really. They are so well coached and they are prepared and I don’t know that they had to come in and prepare any differently because we won the game back in April. I do think obviously they were aware that we did beat them, but I don’t think that was what Coach Corbin talked about prior to the game. That we need to go back and get the revenge and beat them. I just think that they were out there with their number one guy in the first game of a regional just like we were, and they put together a good game. I think they put it together you know in just that one inning. They were able to, as I told my team, you know that’s the thing we you give up those freebies you know a good team they broke us in that one inning. That was hard for us to bounce back from especially with the pitching staff they have that is going to close the game out. You know, I was proud of our guys for how we fought and how we came back, but that one inning we had four base hits and three freebies and that is hard to bounce back from.”

On what they could take from this game heading into tomorrow’s matchup:

“Yeah we talked about that just for a split second, and you guys know these guys after the game their attention spans pretty tough. They just lost not everybody’s in the mindset of wanting to hear some words of wisdom from the ole ball coach. You know, I just kind of challenged them a little bit. That we played. That these are the games we talked about all year long. You can’t expect in this moment for anyone to give you anything. You know, especially a team the caliber of Vanderbilt they aren’t going to give you anything, and nobody in this regional is going to give you anything. We can’t wait around for that to happen. We have got to go out and do the same thing. We can’t give things away and give freebies and give base runners away ourselves. So, I think I just encouraged them to go back to the routine and let’s get some sleep. The best thing about baseball is that we play again tomorrow. You know, we have our backs against the wall that ole saying, but so does everybody else at some point in this tournament will have that as well. So, I think that if we could go ahead and play right now just to get the bad taste out of your mouth I think they would probably be ready to do it. We will be back tomorrow and I think we will be ready to go again.”

Lipscomb pitcher Ian Martinez-McGraw
On approach of facing Vanderbilt’s lineup:
“My approach didn’t change at all. I tried to get ahead with the fastball. I fell behind a couple times. I factored in the knuckleball a little bit more. I haven’t thrown it as much this season as I did in this game. They just executed when they had to. You have to give all the credit to their offense. They just clicked on all cylinders today. I think they played with a chip on their shoulder because of what happened earlier this season. Basically my approach just stayed the same that it has been all season.”

Lipscomb first baseman Adam Lee
On how comfortable you were earlier in the game after scoring a run on Fulmer:
“We were pretty comfortable about how we were going to attack Fulmer and how to approach his pitching. We got some guys on early and moved them. But we never really got that big hit to propel the offense and tonight we just fell a little bit short.”

On Fulmer getting stronger throughout the game:
“We got into some bad counts and swung at some bad pitches. We knew we had to take advantage of some opportunities but unfortunately we didn’t do that.”

On what led to his hit and the only RBI in the game against Fulmer:
“I just had a long at bat and saw a lot of pitches and fortunately I think he made a mistake on a 3-2 pitch with a slider and I was able to put a good swing on it and get a base hit.”