Alabama Comeback Caps Sweep of Vanderbilt, 6-5
4/23/2006 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
TUSCALOOSA, Ala.-- The No. 11 University of Alabama baseball team scored twice in the bottom of the eighth inning to earn its second Southeastern Conference series sweep of the season with a 6-5 win over No. 16 Vanderbilt in front of 4,870 fans at Sewell-Thomas Stadium on Sunday afternoon.
Alabama (31-12, 13-5 SEC) increased its lead over Kentucky and South Carolina to two games in the overall SEC standings with 12 games to play. The Wildcats and Gamecocks are the co-leaders in the Eastern Division with identical 11-7 records. Kentucky swept South Carolina in Lexington this weekend to achieve the first-place tie. Vanderbilt (25-16, 10-8 SEC) fell into third place in the SEC Eastern Division with its season-high fourth straight loss.
The Crimson Tide also owns a three-game lead over Arkansas (10-8) and Ole Miss (10-8) in the SEC Western Division race.
Sophomore first baseman Matt Bentley's infield ground out scored senior catcher Kody Valverde with the tying run and junior left fielder Brandon Belcher lined a single to center to score senior second baseman Evan Bush with the winning run as the Tide notched its fifth straight win with its 13th come-from-behind win of the season.
Valverde led off the eighth and reached on shortstop Dominic de la Osa's error. Bush then walked and freshman right fielder Ryan Rhoden moved the tying and winning runs into scoring potion with his school-record tying second sacrifice bunt of the game. Bentley, a left-hander, pinch-hit for freshman backup first baseman Wes Henderson, and hit a slow roller to short off right-hander Casey Weathers to score Valverde with the tying run. Belcher then laced a single to center and Bush scored ahead of David Macias' throw with what proved to the be the winning run.
"That's huge," Alabama head coach Jim Wells said following the Tide's first sweep over the Commodores since 2000. "We talked about that before the game, the meaning of a sweep. Championship teams sweep. You've got to finish games and we did a better job of finishing this one. That was huge. We're growing as a team. That was a tough one today. They're all tough but that was the toughest of the three."
Vanderbilt put two runners on base in a controversial ninth inning against senior right hander Jordan Davis. Matt Meingasner led off with a single to left on a 2-2 pitch and moved to second when Macias was hit by a pitch for the second time in the game.
Sophomore right-hander David Robertson was summoned from the bullpen and he struck out freshman third baseman Pedro Alvarez on three pitches for the first out. Then came the controversy involving Macias and de la Osa. de la Osa, whose error led to a pair of unearned runs in the eighth inning, hit a sharp grounder to Bush at second base, who threw to shortstop Greg Paiml to retire Macias. Paiml's relay throw was late to first base, but third base umpire Fred Cannon, positioned at second base, called de la Osa out on the slide-rule, contact double play to end the game.
The call drew the ire of Vanderbilt first base coach Erik Bakich and head coach Tim Corbin. SEC crew chief Alexander Davis then ejected Corbin from the game. With the post-game ejection, Corbin will sit out Vanderbilt's non-conference game with Austin Peay on Tuesday night.
"I didn't see what the runner did," Alabama head coach Jim Wells said. "I just saw the umpire was getting himself in the posture to call him out. What a break. It was a good call for us. I've never seen a game determined by something like that before."
Jordan Davis (1-2), who ran his streak to 13 1/3 consecutive innings without an earned run, notched his first win of the season. Robertson worked the final inning for his league-leading seventh save.
"It's big for us,"Wells added. "The next component we have to have are the guys coming out of the pen and you feel good about it and they can finish the game and that will give them a lot of confidence. That's what we've been missing here for about a month. If we can get that part going, we're getting in a position where we can be a pretty good team."
Shao (0-1) took the loss for the Commodores. He allowed four runs and three hits in 3 1/3 innings. He walked one and struck out three batters.
The Crimson Tide's two-run eighth inning capped a see-saw affair in the final four innings that saw both teams grab and lose the lead.
Trailing 3-2 in the sixth inning, Alabama scored two runs off Shao to take a 4-3 lead. Valverde led off the inning with a single to left and Bush followed with a walk. Rhoden laid down a sac bunt to push both runners into scoring position and pinch-hitter Wes Henderson, a redshirt freshman from Oxford, double off the wall in left to give the Tide a 4-3 lead.
"Henderson got the big hit," Wells said. "He had a nice weekend. He swung the bat well and got a huge hit. And Bentley comes in and puts the bat on the ball. It was a team effort. A lot of guys who don't normally play had a big part in the win."
The lead was short-lived as Vandy scored twice in the seventh inning to chase starter Tommy Hunter. Meingasner led off with a base hit and Macias was awarded first base on a disputed hit by pitch. After Alvarez flied out, de la Osa singled to left to drive home Meingasner with the tying run. Ryan Flaherty greeted Davis with a single to right to score Macias and give Vandy the 5-4 lead.
Vanderbilt plated single runs in each of the first two innings to take a 2-0 lead. David Macias scored on Ryan Flaherty's RBI ground out in the first inning and Shea Robin scored on Adam Feinberg's RBI ground out in the second inning.
Alabama cut the lead to 2-1 in the third inning when Brandon Belcher drew a lead off walk and scored on Matt Downs two-out single up the middle.
Vanderbilt took advantage of lead off walk and an error in the fourth inning to take a 3-1 lead. Ryan Flaherty reached on a lead off walk and moved to second when Shea Robin reached on Bush's error with one out. Flaherty moved to third on Ryan Davis' ground and then scored when Adam Feinberg reached on an infield single that Alabama pitcher Tommy Hunter.
Alabama got a run back in the bottom of the inning when Valverde singled and later scored on first baseman Spencer Pennington's ground out to cut the lead to 3-2.
Alabama will play its final non-conference game of the 2006 season on Wednesday night at 6:30 p.m. (CT) as they take on the UAB Blazers at the Hoover Met. The Crimson Tide will host arch-rival Auburn next weekend in a three-game SEC series at the Joe. A limited number of tickets remain for the Alabama-Auburn series and are available by calling the UA Ticket Office at 205-348-2262 or on-line at www.rolltide.com
