Vanderbilt flexed its muscles Sunday, putting on a thorough and dominant offensive performance while clinching the series win over Tennessee.
Vanderbilt 10 12 0
Tennessee 4 5 0
W — Charles McElvain, L — Blade Tidwell
Notes
Blade Tidwell was cruising for 2.2 innings before Enrique Bradfield Jr. singled up the middle to give the Commodores a two-out baserunner. From there, Tidwell struggled as Bradfield stole second and third and the Commodores’ tallied four straight singles to take a 3-2 lead. Tidwell would eventually strand the bases loaded to limit the damage, but the freshman threw 38 pitches in the inning and completely lost the groove he was in. After giving up a single to leadoff the fourth inning he was pulled from the game.
Vanderbilt’s lineup went to work in the middle innings, scoring two or more runs every single inning from the third to the sixth. It obviously wasn’t a good outing for Kirby Connell (2IP, 4ER) or Camden Sewell (0.2IP, 2ER) but give a lot of credit to Vanderbilt. That lineup is very solid top to bottom and they made everything difficult on Tennessee’s pitching. Vanderbilt showed why it’s been one of the nation’s top programs the last decade, responding from a gut wrenching Saturday night with a very good performance.
Connor Pavolony’s absence was noticeable as Vanderbilt tallied six stolen bases. Some of that is simply Bradfield, the SEC’s best base stealer, reaching base three times today after really struggling the first two games of the series. Greer isn’t much of a step back at the plate, where he was great today walking twice and hitting a solo homer. Still, Pavolony is a massive upgrade defensively and I think you’ll consistently see teams try their luck on the basepaths until he’s back.
This loss hands Tennessee its first series loss of the season as the Vols fall to 10-5 in SEC play at the halfway point. In the 10 years prior to Vitello’s arrival, Tennessee won 10 or more SEC games just five times. The Vols never won more than 13 in that stretch. This year’s squad will look to match that number next weekend with a series sweep at Texas A&M.
Tennessee’s offense tallied just five hits with four of them being solo homers. Was a bit of an uncharacteristic weekend for the Vols’ offense but more on that in tomorrow’s 3-2-1.
Tony Vitello on Blade Tidwell’s performance
“I think self doubt can creep in. I don’t know if that’s the case at all, not a lot of conversations between me and some of those guys or normally that would be Frank and I’d kind of be the guy he’d relay that to. That’s for him to navigate through and each time he’s out there he’s learning more and more about himself. How to grind through a rough outing at Alabama. What it’s like when you have a series sweep on the line. What it’s like when it’s 1-1, he’s done that a few times with Georgia and this weekend. Bring on the repetitions for the young man. He certainly has the physical ability but I think at times for our players they’ve complicated things when they haven’t gone as well for them as we would have liked.”
Vitello assessing where his team is at at the halfway point in SEC play
“To have two handfuls of wins is huge. In this league, basically people talk about if you go .500 you’re going to have a good year. Well, we’re greedy for more. We’ve put ourselves in a good position record wise to continue to have success but my biggest thing is where we’re at is April and we need to keep marching towards May and I really feel like this can catapult us a little bit in May to handle other situations and it might just fuel this week a little bit.”
Vanderbilt 10 12 0
Tennessee 4 5 0
W — Charles McElvain, L — Blade Tidwell
Notes
Blade Tidwell was cruising for 2.2 innings before Enrique Bradfield Jr. singled up the middle to give the Commodores a two-out baserunner. From there, Tidwell struggled as Bradfield stole second and third and the Commodores’ tallied four straight singles to take a 3-2 lead. Tidwell would eventually strand the bases loaded to limit the damage, but the freshman threw 38 pitches in the inning and completely lost the groove he was in. After giving up a single to leadoff the fourth inning he was pulled from the game.
Vanderbilt’s lineup went to work in the middle innings, scoring two or more runs every single inning from the third to the sixth. It obviously wasn’t a good outing for Kirby Connell (2IP, 4ER) or Camden Sewell (0.2IP, 2ER) but give a lot of credit to Vanderbilt. That lineup is very solid top to bottom and they made everything difficult on Tennessee’s pitching. Vanderbilt showed why it’s been one of the nation’s top programs the last decade, responding from a gut wrenching Saturday night with a very good performance.
Connor Pavolony’s absence was noticeable as Vanderbilt tallied six stolen bases. Some of that is simply Bradfield, the SEC’s best base stealer, reaching base three times today after really struggling the first two games of the series. Greer isn’t much of a step back at the plate, where he was great today walking twice and hitting a solo homer. Still, Pavolony is a massive upgrade defensively and I think you’ll consistently see teams try their luck on the basepaths until he’s back.
This loss hands Tennessee its first series loss of the season as the Vols fall to 10-5 in SEC play at the halfway point. In the 10 years prior to Vitello’s arrival, Tennessee won 10 or more SEC games just five times. The Vols never won more than 13 in that stretch. This year’s squad will look to match that number next weekend with a series sweep at Texas A&M.
Tennessee’s offense tallied just five hits with four of them being solo homers. Was a bit of an uncharacteristic weekend for the Vols’ offense but more on that in tomorrow’s 3-2-1.
Tony Vitello on Blade Tidwell’s performance
“I think self doubt can creep in. I don’t know if that’s the case at all, not a lot of conversations between me and some of those guys or normally that would be Frank and I’d kind of be the guy he’d relay that to. That’s for him to navigate through and each time he’s out there he’s learning more and more about himself. How to grind through a rough outing at Alabama. What it’s like when you have a series sweep on the line. What it’s like when it’s 1-1, he’s done that a few times with Georgia and this weekend. Bring on the repetitions for the young man. He certainly has the physical ability but I think at times for our players they’ve complicated things when they haven’t gone as well for them as we would have liked.”
Vitello assessing where his team is at at the halfway point in SEC play
“To have two handfuls of wins is huge. In this league, basically people talk about if you go .500 you’re going to have a good year. Well, we’re greedy for more. We’ve put ourselves in a good position record wise to continue to have success but my biggest thing is where we’re at is April and we need to keep marching towards May and I really feel like this can catapult us a little bit in May to handle other situations and it might just fuel this week a little bit.”
