After a brief rain delay to the start of the game in Omaha, things couldn’t have gone much better for TCU in their 10-3 opening World Series victory over LSU. The Frogs capitalized on the Tigers’ season high four errors, rode seven strong innings from starter Preston Morrison (5 hits, 0 walks and 5 strikeouts on just 89 pitches) and looked very much like a team that had “been here” before with opportunistic scoring and solid defense. LSU for their part needed all hands on deck (or should I say on the mound) as they used a World Series record-tying eight pitchers after Tigers starter Jarod Poche’ opened the scoring door for the Frogs with two crazy throwing errors in the top of the fourth.
Poche’ breezed through the TCU batting order for the first three innings before things went terribly wrong for the sophomore left-hander. Poche’ got Cody Jones to hit a weak come-backer to him but then proceeded to air mail the easy throw to first base. Poche’ followed that up with a second throw over his first baseman’s head on another come-backer from the Frogs’ Jeremie Fagnan. The Frogs capitalized on the miscues by scoring 2 runs and they never looked back as Poche’ was clearly rattled and soon headed for the bench.
TCU (50-13) now moves into the winners’ bracket and will play the winner of Cal-State Fullerton vs. Vanderbilt tomorrow night at 7:00pm (Central). That game was suspended last night when the rains came in the 6th inning with CSF leading Vandy 3-0, and will resume today at 11:00am (Central).
For those not familiar with (or confused by) the College World Series format, here’s a look at how it runs:
The eight teams in Omaha are divided into two brackets of four teams each. One bracket includes Arkansas, Virginia, Florida and Miami (Fla). TCU is in the other bracket with LSU, Cal-State Fullerton and Vanderbilt. The four winners of the first round games (TCU, Virginia, Florida & winner of CSF/Vanderbilt ) move into the winners’ bracket and will play each other next (TCU vs. CFS/Vanderbilt and Virginia vs. Florida). The losers of the first round match-ups move into the losers’ bracket and play each other next (LSU vs loser of CFS/Vanderbilt, and Arkansas vs. Miami ) with the losers of those games going home. The Series is a double-elimination tournament – meaning lose 2 games and you go home – so we’ll be down to 6 teams after Tuesday night (weather permitting). The format repeats itself twice more and a 2nd loss always means you are sent packing until there is only one team left in each bracket. Those remaining two teams then face each other in a best-of-three series to decide the National Champion. Losses don’t roll over from the bracket round to the finals however, which means you can technically lose two games in Omaha – one in the bracket round and one in the finals – and still take home the trophy.
