Tennessee baseball opened up its NCAA Tournament run with a decisive 9-2 victory over Miami (Ohio) on Friday night at Lindsey Nelson Stadium. Liam Doyle turned in a strong outing while the Vols’ offense had a consistent and steady approach.
Following the game, Tennessee head coach Tony Vitello discussed Doyle helping save the bullpen, what went right for the offense and much more. Here’s everything Vitello said.
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Opening Statement
“I don’t have much of anything crazy to say, other than we watched some video on these guys – it’s very apparent they play the game the right way. They play hard. There’s a reason why they were able to win the [MAC] tournament. They kind of made it look easy. So, it was a very competitive game, especially early on. I thought both of our lefties, [Liam Doyle and Andrew Behnke], did an outstanding job. I know we mixed in [Austin] Breedlove in there, he did exactly what we asked him to do. Behnke was very similar to what he was last year in our regional to help kind of finish off the game for us. And then both teams can say this, I thought our guys took a lot of good swings where we didn’t necessarily get a great result. So that’s an approach we’d like to keep. And I’m sure Miami of Ohio is saying the same thing, because they barreled up some balls they didn’t get anything on either. Great environment, as well. First game was very competitive. It was loud, at least in the office, and then the crowd doubled in size and probably doubled in noise too.”
On Liam Doyle finding his groove in today’s outing, saving the bullpen
“It was huge. It is a tournament. I mean, it’s really a fresh start to the whole deal. There’s a lot of information from the games we played prior, but none of them really matter. It is about tonight, or at least was, but you do have a tournament, again, you’re in the middle of. For him to do that, not only—I’m sure he feels good about and it helped capitalize on the runs we were scoring in the middle of the game—but put us in a good position with our bullpen.”
On navigating this season coming off of last year’s result
“It was a headache going into the year and early parts of the fall. You’ve got commitments and requests and even celebrations that maybe kind of interfere with what this group is trying to do. I think it was kind of unspoken. And at times in our meeting room during the season, at times, it was said out loud that we need to come together as a group. It needs to be about this year all that good stuff that can sometimes sound corny, but it really happened. I mean, they kind of forged together, merged together as a group with a lot of new faces, like Liam [Doyle]. The team chemistry was built and then there was a little bit of, call it edge, or motivation or focus, to make sure there’s a clear line of separation. This is a new year and we’re not going to get caught with the hangover from last year, or however you want to phrase it. We came out of the gate strong, probably you could argue a little bit too strong. I think some people outside of this room thought you can play this game and be invincible and roll up on people, especially in our league, which this time of year, everybody’s capable of being the best team in any league. It was an interesting storyline, but I thought this group did a phenomenal job with it. Then when the league started, we had a winning record in the league. We dished out more than we took, but we took a lot too, and it’s one of the reasons why SEC teams have fared fairly well in postseason. It prepares you going through all that stuff.”
On if he knows Jordan Bischel and what they were able to see out of Cincinnati today
“[He was at] Central Michigan. We didn’t play them, but one of our staff members worked for him last year. We certainly know he’s won everywhere he’s been, despite maybe not having the resources where others have a little more favorable circumstances, I guess is the easiest way to say it. He’s won everywhere he’s been. And a part of it is what he likes to do with the numbers and really implement a very specific style of baseball. Those guys, like I said, everyone was energized here for game one of the playoffs, but they’ve got a little extra stuff going on energy-wise and team camaraderie-wise in the dugout. And then also, they want to do a bunch of different things on offense. So, they were able to beat, again, another outstanding team, [Wake Forest], from a phenomenal league by using exactly the brand of baseball that he’s tried to kind of stamp on any program he’s been a part.”
