FAYETTEVILLE — On a day when Dave Van Horn hoped to get good pitching since he had used 10 the first two games of the series the trio of Gage Wood, Landon Beidelschies and Will McEntire delivered for an 8-4 win over No. 17 Tennessee.
No. 5 Arkansas (43-12, 20-10) only had to use three pitchers against Tennessee (41-15, 16-14) in winning the series following Thursday night's loss. In addition to the pitching, Arkansas got timely hitting scoring its eight runs on just seven hits. Among the hits was a grand slam by Ryder Helfrick in the bottom of the third. Van Horn was happy with his squad as they got to 20 conference wins and have almost certainly locked down a Top-8 national seed. The Hogs will also get a double bye at the SEC Tournament this next week.
"As far as pitching wise, Gage had really good stuff," Van Horn said. "He just wasn’t locating quite the way we were hoping. Give Tennessee credit, they fouled off pitches and they worked him and got his pitch count up there. And then we had like a 30-minute inning so we decided we’d better get him. Landon gave us two really good innings. The third inning you could see by the numbers the fastball went from 92-93-94 to 90 and you know it just wasn’t good. I think he got us an out there then a walk and a homer.
"We had Will ready to go and Will pitched great. Just filling up the zone with fastballs, cutters and curveballs and just did a tremendous job. Because their lefty came in and shut us down pretty good at the end. It almost looked like both teams were getting a little tired to be honest with you. But yeah, big win for us."
The big hit for Arkansas was in a five-run third. Helfrick blasted his grand slam to put the Hogs up 6-2. Charles Davalan singled to start the inning. He went to second on a balk and then scored when Wehiwa Aloy's ground ball was booted by the Vols second baseman for an error. Then starter Tegan Kuhns walked to next two to load the bases. Tony Vitello went to the bullpen and brought in Austin Breedlove. That is when Helfrick greeted him with a grand slam.
"So I knew the wind was slightly blowing in earlier," Van Horn said. "It was kind of all over the place today and in batting practice the same way. But it’s warm and the ball was carrying. To answer your question, when he hit it, when it first left the bat I wasn’t sure. And then when it started going up, I said, ‘That’s gonna go.’ Just because it had a lot of backspin. I mean he crushed it straight up. What, 46 degrees or something like that. Yeah, but I was a little nervous because at the end it barely fell over the fence. I don’t know where it landed. I thought it was going to go in the green seats when it got up to the top, but I guess it came straight down. I don’t even know the distance on it but he hit it really hard, he just hit it up. To answer your question again, I wasn’t 100% sure.'
Tennessee took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first against starter Wood. The Vols got their first three hitters on base each with singles. But Wood recovered and struck out the next three hitters.
In the bottom of the first, Wehiwa Aloy doubled with one out. He scored on a Helfrick two-out single to tie the game.
Cannon Peebles singled with one out in the top of the second. He scored on a two-out double by Andrew Fischer putting the Vols up 2-1.
The Hogs stretched the lead 7-2 in the bottom of the fourth when Wehiwa Aloy hit a bomb over the fence in right field. In the bottom of the fifth, Reese Robinett walked to start the inning. He eventually scored the Hogs final run on a single by Logan Maxwell.
Tennessee scored the final two runs in the top of the sixth on a home run by Fischer with Manny Marin on base. That is when McEntire entered the game for Beidelschies and retired all 11 hitters he faced.
Wood (2-1) got the win. He pitched three innings allowing seven hits, two runs, walked one and fanned seven. Beidelschies then pitched 2.1 innings allowing just two hits, a pair of runs, walking three and striking out a trio. McEntire struck out four in his perfect performance on the mound. That was the second save of the season for McEntire. The three Razorbacks combined to allow nine hits, walked four and fanned 14.
"That’s probably a lot of hard work," Van Horn said of McEntire. "What I mean by that is he hadn’t pitched in a while. But he just kept working, just kept working, probably getting more frustrated, ‘I want to pitch, I want to pitch.’ And then when he got on the mound, he just let it go. He had to pitch fearless and he did. He just went at them. It was just great to see because we didn’t know if he was going to be able to go one inning or three or a couple hitters. You always have to have Plan B and we didn’t have to use anything, which is great."
Tennessee used five pitchers with Kuhns (2-3) taking the loss. Tennessee's pitchers combined to allow just seven hits, but walked nine and struck out 12.
Arkansas finishes the regular season in second place in SEC. Texas (42-11, 22-8) won the regular season title. LSU (42-13, 19-11) and Vanderbilt (39-16, 19-11) tied for third place.
Arkansas 8, Tennessee 6
No. 5 Arkansas defeated No. 17 Tennessee 8-6 Friday night at Baum-Walker Stadium to even the series.
Cole Gibler (2-1) worked 3.1 innings in relief of starter Aiden Jimenez to pick up the win. Gibler limited Tennessee to three hits, no runs, one walk and fanned a trio. In addition, Arkansas got home runs from Brent Iredale, Ryder Helfrick and Logan Maxwell. Dave Van Horn was pleased to see his team defeat Tennessee ace Liam Doyle (9-3).
"Just a great overall effort from both the offense, our defense and our pitching staff, obviously," Van Horn said. "We faced one of the best pitchers I the country and just fought him, put some big swings on him, hit a couple of home runs. We did a nice job of taking pitches, fouling pitches off and got his pitch count up pretty good after three. I don’t know, just didn’t make any mistakes in the field really and they made one and it cost them a couple of runs. We took advantage of it. We scored on the play when it’s thrown down the line, and then Davalan singles in the next run. All of a sudden we have a four-run lead. Yeah, just a really, really good effort by everybody, especially after the way the game went last night. And then obviously facing their ace and someone who could be voted in as the SEC pitcher of the year. Just proud of our team."
After Tennessee moved ahead of Arkansas 4-3 in the top of the third on doubles by Andrew Fischer and Dalton Bargo as well as singles by Dean Curley and Cannon Peebles the Hogs took the lead for good in bottom half of the inning. Kuhio Aloy was hit by a Doyle pitch and Helfrick followed with a two-run shot over the fence in left field for a 5-4 advantage.
In the bottom of the fourth, Arkansas got a solo shot by Maxwell to go up 6-4. In the bottom of the fifth, Iredale walked with one out. He scored on an error on the Vols shortstop and Justin Thomas Jr. getting a single. Thomas then scored when Charles Davalan singled for an 8-4 lead.
Tennessee got a two-run home run by Levi Clark in the top of the seventh to pull within two, but that was when Christian Foutch came in and closed the door on the visitors. Foutch pitched two innings. He allowed one hit, no runs, walked a hitter and fanned one while earning his fourth save of the season.
Jimenez started his first game as a Razorback. He worked 2.1 innings, allowing seven hits, four runs, walked none and struck out no Vols. Parker Coil was the other Arkansas pitcher.
Curley doubled for Tennessee in the top of the second then scored on a single by Peebles. But the Razorbacks got a two-run home run by Iredale in the bottom half of the inning and then Wehiwa Aloy plated Thomas for a 3-1 lead. Van Horn praised Iredale.
"I mean, first off, the home run was awesome," Van Horn said. "He's the one that got jammed last night with the bases loaded with two outs. He had a chance, he was just a little bit late. And the whole thing we talked to him about today is, don't be late. Let it fly. Go for it. And he got that one. I think it was a 3-1 pitch, maybe. And the diving effort, I mean, if he'd have been playing a normal third base, it'd have been an easy catch for him, but he was playing over in the shortstop area with a little bit of the shift on there. One of their best hitters up, leads the league in home runs, and man, if you can get him to pop out on a check swing, and Iredale went for that too. And he just made an incredible catch and he slid hard into the into the pad. I was worried about his neck a little bit, and the shoulder. He was pretty scraped up, but it was just an incredible effort and a great play, and the team loved it."
The Hogs got to Doyle early and often. He lasted 4.2 innings. Doyle, Tennessee's ace, allowed 11 hits, eight runs, six earned, walked two and struck out 10 Hogs. Austin Breedlove, Brandon Arvidson and Tanner Franklin pitched for the Vols.
Arkansas (42-12, 19-10) and Tennessee (41-14, 16-13) will play the final game of the series and regular season on Saturday at 2 p.m. Gage Wood will get the start for Arkansas with the game televised on the SEC Network.
Arkansas 7, Tennessee 10
Arkansas (41-12, 18-10) only led once, 2-1, in the bottom of the second. Tennessee (41-13, 16-12) took a 4-2 lead in the top of the fourth and never trailed again. Arkansas Coach Dave Van Horn used six pitchers in the game with starter Zack Root (6-4) taking the loss on a night when he simply didn't have his stuff. Root only pitched 3.2 innings, allowing seven hits, four runs, walking two and striking out four. He threw 68 pitches.
"Well, he didn’t have his good stuff really from the get go," Van Horn said. "He didn’t have a breaking ball and wasn’t locating his fastball like he normally does, compared to what we’ve seen the last couple of weeks. But yeah, in that inning, a lot of just behind in the count — 2-0, 3-1. Gave up a couple of big hits and just fought it out there. They did a good job and laid off pitches and you just can’t pitch like that. You can’t pitch behind in the count against a good hitting team and that’s what happened."
The Razorbacks stranded 12 runners which hurt, but the Vols left 11 on as well. The Razorbacks loaded the bases in the seventh but was unable to push a run across. The Hogs did plate three runs in the bottom of the eighth though to pull to within 7-6. Reese Robinett and Justin Thomas Jr. led off the inning with singles. Wehiwa Aloy followed with a one-out single that got both Robinett and Thomas across the plate. Logan Maxwell singled to get Wehiwa Aloy to third. Kuhio Aloy then plated his brother with an RBI single.
"Oh yeah, we just talked about it," Van Horn said. "I mean, I know we left 12 on for the game, but it was early in the game, that’s when we had to score some runs. We left a lot of runners out there. We put together some innings, whether it was hits or a base on balls, I think we got hit by pitch, leadoff guy’s on, second base no outs, whatever the case may be, we just didn’t get them in. Give him credit for wiggling out of some jams. That probably was the difference in the game. Early we should have added on to that 2-1 lead. They did a nice job getting that relay throw at the plate to keep it from being 3-1 with Aloy coming up, but that’s the way the game works sometimes."
But just down one run, Van Horn opted to go to Hunter Dietz out of the bullpen which proved to be a disaster. Reese Chapman singled to start the top of the ninth against Dietz. Then Cannon Peebles sent a shot over the fence in right field for two runs. Levi Clark singled and eventually scored on a throwing error by Maxwell in right field fielding a Gavin Kilen single. Van Horn was asked why he went to Dietz after getting it to just one run.
"Yeah, he was loose," Van Horn said. "He was going to go in. Then we got it to one. He threw really good the other day. Today was 92-93. The other night, 95-97. So I don't know. Not the same guy."
The Hogs plated Robinett in the bottom of the ninth to set the final score. Robinett singled, then took second and scored on a single by Thomas.
The Vols got on the scoreboard first with a solo home run by Dalton Bargo off of Root. The Hogs answered that in the bottom of the second. Ryder Helfrick and Brent Iredale both singled with one out. Robinett walked and Thomas struck out. But, with two outs, Davalan doubled to get both Helfrick and Iredale home for a 2-1 lead.
Trailing 4-2 in bottom of the fifth, the Razorbacks got a one-out single by Maxwell. Kuhio Aloy doubled to plate Maxwell to pull within 4-3.
The game got out of control for the Hogs in the top of the seventh when Bargo hit a two-run home run and then Dean Curley followed with a solo shot for back-to-back home runs. The Vols held a 7-3 lead.
In addition to Root and Dietz, Arkansas used Gabe Gaeckle, Dylan Carter, Ben Bybee and Christian Foutch. They combined to allow 10 runs, 15 hits, struck out 11 and walked seven.
Tennessee used five pitchers with AJ Russell (1-1) getting the win. He was the third Vol to take the mound. He pitched two innings. He allowed two hits, no runs, walked a pair and fanned three. Marcus Phillips and Dylan Loy pitched prior to Russell then Tanner Franklin and Nate Snead followed. They combined to allow seven runs, 15 hits, fanned eight and walked five. Phillips started and worked 4.1 innings. He allowed seven hits, three runs, walked a trio and fanned three Hogs. Tony Vitello talked about his pitching staff.
"The pitching group as a whole was a team effort because D Loy and T-Frank were the least amount as far as pitch count, but those were two massive outs," Vitello said. "Then Nate Snead grinded out what are the most difficult outs at the end of the game. But the table was set. Marcus was asked to throw on kind of short notice there because of some stuff with Liam. Get him rested up and of course AJ behind him has still been trying to find his way where he's in a rhythm because he's been coming off injury. So both guys battled adversity before we even got here. And then in the stadium with the crowd. And of course, the great lineup. One of the… I don't know statistically, but probably you can argue one of the better, if not best lineup in the country. So big time performance by all those guys."
