OMAHA, Neb. — For the first time this postseason Vanderbilt is facing elimination.
Having lost 1-0 to North Carolina State on Wednesday at the College World Series, the Commodores (46-16) need to beat Stanford at 6 p.m. Wednesday at TD Ameritrade Park to keep their season alive. A victory then would earn Vandy a rematch with North Carolina State at 1 p.m. Friday.
The Dores took the day Tuesday to regroup after an excruciating one-run loss in which a solo home run in the fifth inning by the Wolfpack stood as the game’s only run.
“They’re going to be motivated for sure. This is a tough one for them. It’s not going to sit well with them. But it’s part of the game and it’s part of what you go through,” Vanderbilt head coach Tim Corbin said. “It’s a one-game tournament anyway. It was North Carolina State (Monday). It will be Stanford on Wednesday. We just got more free baseball.”
Vandy has never come out of the so-called loser’s bracket to win the College World Series in its previous four trips to the event. It will need three wins in four days to advance to the championship series which begins Monday.
What should give the team some added confidence is only twice this season has it lost back-to-back games. And Monday’s starter, Jack Leiter, went eight brilliant innings in an outing that rested Vanderbilt’s arms for Wednesday – and perhaps beyond.
The Commodores could hand the ball to freshman Patrick Reilly (4-2, 4.89), sophomore Thomas Schultz (4-2, 4.19), freshman Christian Little (3-1, 5.02) or sophomore Chris McElvain (5-1, 3.92) – to name a few – for Wednesday’s affair.
“What happens is more people get pulled into the fray, which is good. We brought 27 people. We’re going to have to use them,” said Corbin who would record his 800th career win at Vanderbilt with a victory Wednesday. “What (Leiter) did is he preserved a pitching staff. So from that vantage point it’s good because he kept the bullpen down and he kept other people down.
“We’re just going to have to use our roster. We’ve been in situations like this before. And we’ve played tough baseball and we do have a resilient group. And you need to be when you come here. Everything’s not going to go your way. And there’s been a lot of people that have finished this tournament that didn’t start the way they wanted to.”
Stanford, 6-2 in the NCAA Tournament, received an at-large bid to the national postseason after finishing 17-10 in the Pac-12 Conference. The Cardinal (39-16) were 24-9 going into the second weekend in May.
Senior outfielder Christian Robinson leads four Stanford players hitting better than .300 while sophomore outfielder Brock Jones (59) is one of six who has driven in more than 30 runs. Senior Brendan Beck (9-2, 3.06) started Saturday’s loss to North Carolina State while junior Alex Williams (5-2, 3.42) started Monday’s win that eliminated league rival Arizona. Closer and senior Zach Grech has 13 saves.
Stanford beat Texas Tech in a Super Regional in Lubbock, Texas, by a combined scored of 24-3.
Vanderbilt has faced Stanford 19 times with the first meeting coming in 1973 and the last coming in 2016 during a three-game series at Stanford. A win would improve the Dores to 11-9 all-time in the series – but much more importantly keep a season alive.
“I think it’s kind of back to the basics, relax a little bit, have some fun,” Leiter said on how his teammates may respond Wednesday night. “It’s pretty cool, 20,000-plus people watching us play a game. And I think that in its own should let us relax a little bit, have some fun and kind of just play the game, see what happens.
“It’s like every other game. It’s just obviously a little more meaning to the outsiders, but you want to win every game.”
— Chad Bishop covers Vanderbilt for VUCommodores.com.
Follow him @MrChadBishop.
