Missed opportunities linger after Cards loss – The Courier-Journal
Louisville coach Dan McDonnell and key players talk about their loss to UCSB and exit from the NCAA tournament.
Sam Upshaw Jr./The CJ
The Louisville baseball team lost Game 2 of its NCAA super regional on a walk-off grand slam Sunday. The Cardinals led 3-0 in the bottom of the ninth before UC Santa Barbara’s Sam Cohen launched a home run that left everyone in Jim Patterson Stadium stunned.
It would be tempting to say that one at-bat spoiled the Cardinals’ season, but in reality there were multiple missed opportunities Sunday that all lend credence to the question: What if?
Brendan McKay, who hit a two-out solo home run to kick off Louisville’s three-run fourth inning, acknowledged his team failed to take advantage of key situations.
“We had a lot of guys on second or third with less than two outs or even two outs, we had some good pitches to swing at or some balls we could’ve laid off and battled more, but we just didn’t do it, or we just didn’t make some plays at the right time,” McKay said. “Tough luck of the game.”
With two outs in the top of the second, Blake Tiberi singled for Louisville’s first hit of the game. He was thrown out running to second but wasn’t officially caught stealing. Nonetheless, the Cardinals still came away from the inning scoreless.
Danny Rosenbaum hit a leadoff single up the middle for the Cardinals in the top of the third and advanced to second on a sacrifice bunt from Colin Lyman. Logan Taylor hit a grounder right at the UCSB shortstop. Rosenbaum took off for third, and the shortstop made the safe fielder’s choice and threw to the third baseman for the out. Louisville went from one runner in scoring position to zero.
Outfielder Corey Ray reached for the first time in the super regional series by drawing a two-out walk in the top of the fifth but was caught stealing second base in a call that coach Dan McDonnell was not happy with. Replays showed that Ray’s foot never made contact with the bag; he slid into the fielder instead. McDonnell felt Ray was ahead of the throw, and that the UCSB fielder should have been called for blocking the base.
“That’s who we are,” McDonnell said. “We’re aggressive on the bases. Especially in a 48-hour period where it’s not easy to score runs. We felt like we had to push the envelope a bit.”
Lyman singled through the right side in the seventh frame and promptly stole second base. Will Smith took a pitch to the back of the leg and gained a free base, and the Cardinals had two on with one out and a runner in scoring position. But Lyman was picked off at second base, and Ray flied out to end the inning.
It was the same strategy Louisville has used all season; only this time it didn’t turn out as planned. And UCSB noticed.
“We all thought we had a shot going into the last inning because we had that weird knack of finding a way,” Gauchos second baseman JJ Muno said. “And when they weren’t capitalizing with runners in scoring position we just had that feeling.”
Cue Cohen and the shot heard around town. On the bright side, Louisville can learn from its mistakes with this advice from Muno: “You don’t let us hang around.”
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