Griffen Paige gave up two runs on one hit across eight-plus innings, Boston Smith and Luke Arnold homered early,and Wright State held off Vanderbilt in the ninth to knock the No. 1 national seed out of the NCAA Tournament with a 5-4 victory in the Nashville Regional.
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Wright State hangs on late to win 5-4, knocks No. 1 national seed Vanderbilt out of NCAA regionals
Griffen Paige gave up two runs on one hit across eight-plus innings, Boston Smith and Luke Arnold hit back-to-back homers early, and Wright State held off Vanderbilt in the ninth to knock the No. 1 national seed out of the NCAA Tournament with a 5-4 victory in the Nashville Regional on Sunday.
The Commodores (43-18) became the first No. 1 national seed to fail to reach their regional final since the tournament went to its current format in 1999.
Wright State (39-20), the No. 4 regional seed out of the Horizon League, plays Louisville in the final Sunday night. The Raiders would have to beat the Cardinals in that game and again Monday to reach a super regional for the first time.
Paige (2-3) walked six, struck out two and allowed Brodie Johnston’s second-inning home run during his 113-pitch outing.
“Biggest game I’ve ever pitched in, and I showed up and went out there trying to get guys out, one out at a time, one pitch at a time. You can’t do anything else,” Paige said.
Just sayin': Wright fricken State!!! Why couldn't the Ohio State baseball team (who went 13-37, and 5-25 in the B1G this past season) recruited some of those guys?....