TCU Relies On Experience, And Stingy Bullpen, To Eliminate Louisville

T-C-U!! pic.twitter.com/oMD9AE8REa

— NCAA Baseball (@NCAACWS) June 23, 2017

OMAHA—In its four straight trips to the College World Series, Texas Christian has found itself in nearly every conceivable situation. Experience is one of the Horned Frogs’ greatest strengths.

Facing elimination Thursday against Louisville, TCU drew on that experience to grind out a 4-3 victory. The Horned Frogs (49-17) advanced to baseball’s final four for the third year in a row and will take on Florida in Friday’s bracket final.

They will need to beat the Gators twice to advance to their first ever finals.

“I felt like it was a classic ballgame from beginning to end,” coach Jim Schlossnagle said. “Excited for our team, and looking forward to tomorrow.”

TCU jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the second inning against lefthander Nick Bennett. The freshman retired the first five batters of the game before Elliott Barzilli slashed a single through the right side of the infield. It was all the breakthrough the Horned Frogs needed, as that hit started a string of five straight batters to reach base. Before the two-out rally was over, TCU had four runs home and had knocked Bennett out of the game.

Junior Connor Wanhanen said the key to the inning for TCU was hitters sticking with their approaches at the plate.

“We talk about all the time some of our best swings offensively are when we’re hitting the ball the other way, staying on balls and letting it get deep and really getting our pitch and trusting the plan out there,” Wanhanen said.

The early runs would be all TCU would get, as Louisville’s bullpen trio of Adam Wolf, Sam Bordner and Lincoln Henzman combined to hold the Horned Frogs to four hits and two walks in 6.1 scoreless innings.

Four runs proved to be enough, however. Louisville (53-12) scored three runs off freshman lefthander Nick Lodolo, including solo home runs from Brendan McKay and Logan Taylor.

After Taylor’s leadoff homer in the fifth chased Lodolo, TCU’s bullpen proved to be just as stingy as Louisville’s. Righthander Cal Coughlin got the first two outs of the fifth before giving way to righthander Sean Wymer, who threw 4.1 scoreless innings to close out the win.

Wymer (6-4, 2.10) struck out five batters, walked none and held the Cardinals to two hits. He used his three-pitch mix effectively, working his fastball up to 94 mph to go with his curveball and changeup.

“Throwing for strikes when I want to and throwing down when I want an out pitch,” he said. “Keeping the game simple and making good pitches.”

Wymer twice struck out McKay, the College Player of the Year, and didn’t allow a runner to advance to scoring position. He worked efficiently, throwing 57 pitches, though that workload will make him unavailable Friday and, possibly, Saturday.

TCU has had several big-time relievers under Schlossnagle including Riley Ferrell and Preston Guillory. Wymer’s performance Thursday likely pushes him into those ranks in program history.

“He’s a weapon down there,” Schlossnagle said. “He can pitch in any role. And hopefully we can hang around long enough to where we get to use him again.”

TCU now faces the difficult challenge of having to beat Florida on back-to-back days to advance to the finals. But the Horned Frogs know it is not an impossible challenge—they lost back-to-back games to Coastal Carolina at this stage of last year’s tournament.

“You’ve got to play the games,” Schlossnagle said. “It’s never about the best team, it’s only about the team that plays the best. I think the major league draft will show that Louisville has a much more physically skilled team than our team. And that’s not a slap to our guys, it’s just a fact.

“But we happen to play just a tick better and had some things go our way for sure. So that’s why this game is awesome and that’s why it’s miserable at the same time.”