SEC baseball Friday afternoon regional recap: Vols, Aggies, Razorbacks win

The SEC won three of its four Friday afternoon NCAA tournament games, with only Vanderbilt losing, while Ole Miss-Arizona was postponed.

Tidwell, Vols blank Alabama State

Starter Blade Tidwell threw 7 2/3 innings of scoreless baseball and Jordan Beck homered twice, as Tennessee defeated Alabama State, 10-0, in the Knoxville Regional.

Tidwell, a preseason All-SEC starter, threw his best outing of the season. He allowed just three hits and walked none while fanning seven. 

Luc Lipcius led the Vols (54-7) with three hits, while Beck’s four RBI’s were a game high. Drew Gilbert, Blake Burke and Cortland Lawson also hit home runs. 

The Vols used just Ben Joyce (five pitches) and Mark McLaughlin (23) on Friday. 

Tennessee played without starter Evan Russell--our first-team All-SEC catcher--on Friday. Coach Tony Vitello said Russell was sick and he didn't know if he'd be available for Saturday's game. 

Tennessee faces Campbell in a winner’s bracket game on Saturday; the Camels pounded Georgia Tech, 15-8, behind 18 hits, which included four home runs and six doubles. 

Noland, Arkansas top Grand Canyon

Starter Connor Noland had struggled recently, but saved his best for the Razorbacks’ first NCAA tournament game by throwing seven innings of one-run ball in a 7-1 win over Grand Canyon in the Stillwater Regional.

Third baseman Cayden Wallace slammed two home runs for the Razorbacks (39-18). Catcher Michael Turner led the team with three hits, tying Wallace for the team lead with three RBIs.

The Razorbacks used just two pitchers, with Kole Ramage throwing a pair of shutout innings to finish. Noland struck out just four, got 10 fly-outs and five ground-ball outs.

The Razorbacks await the winner of Oklahoma State and Missouri State.

Aggies outlast Oral Roberts

Texas A&M starter Micah Dallas threw five innings of one-run ball, and the Aggies scored five runs between the seventh and eighth innings to pull away for Oral Roberts, 8-2, in the College Station regional. 

Austin Bost homered and drove in four runs for the Aggies (38-18). The Aggies pounded out 14 hits, the biggest of which was Bost’s three-run home run in the seventh, which broke open a 3-1 game. 

Joseph Menefee threw three innings of one-run relief, striking out seven.

The Aggies await the winner of Friday night’s TCU-Louisiana contest. 

San Diego edges Vanderbilt

San Diego starter Brian Mautz threw seven innings of one-run ball, as the Toreros topped Vanderbilt, 3-2, in the Corvallis regional.

Vanderbilt (36-22) got solo home runs from Dominic Keegan and Calvin Hewett, but couldn’t string together more than four base runners in any inning besides the ninth, when the Commodores stranded two men and didn’t score.

Starter Carter Holton went six innings and gave up three runs (two earned) while reliever Christian Little retired nine of the 10 hitters he faced.

Vandy gets the loser of Friday night’s Oregon State-New Mexico State context in a Saturday loser’s bracket game. The Commodores used two of their better arms on Friday and advancing through Oregon State—the tournament’s No. 3 seed—might be too tall a task for a team that’s dropped six of its past seven games.

Ole Miss-Arizona postponed

A tropical storm warning forced the postponement of both games of the Coral Gables regional to Saturday. Unfortunately,weather for the rest of the weekend doesn’t look much better.