What a weak, embarrassing end to No. 1 Vanderbilt's strong baseball season

USA Today

2 days ago

What a weak, embarrassing end to No. 1 Vanderbilt's strong baseball season
If you happen to see the Vanderbilt baseball team from the past few weeks, the one that won an epic series in Knoxville, swept through the SEC Tournament and earned the NCAA Tournament's No. 1 overall seed, please notify someone on campus. People are looking for those Commodores.
Most of them weren't at the NCAA Regional at Hawkins Field in Nashville, Tennessee.
Most of the Commodores hitters who did show up in their uniforms to lose two games in three days, ending a strong season in the weakest of fashions, were strangers.
They didn't just play poorly. They played tight and timid and terrified of the moment. The opposite of this season's famously clutch performances, these Commodores wanted zero smoke. They wilted in the hazy pressure, and it only got worse as that pressure increased.
A weekend that started alarming, with a close call in a 4-3 comeback victory over Wright State, turned disappointing with a 3-2 loss to Louisville, dropping Vanderbilt into the losers' bracket. Then it just got embarrassing the next afternoon, with Wright State plating four runs in the first inning and withstanding a late rally to hold on for a 5-4 victory in an elimination game, putting Vanderbilt out of its misery.
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And, truly, this was misery for any Vanderbilt fan unfortunate enough to be there to witness it.
The top-seeded Commodores played 27 innings, and they trailed in all but one. Their pitching and defense, for the most part, was solid enough.
But offensively? Haha.
In the opener, the Commodores were no-hit for six innings by a Wright State pitcher, Cam Allen, with an ERA above 5. Against Louisville, they didn't have an extra-base hit or an RBI. Then, in the saddest of them all, Vanderbilt was silenced by another Raiders pitcher, Griffen Paige, who opened the game with an ERA of 8.90. Paige allowed one hit – ONE! – in eight innings.
For the regional, Vanderbilt batted .132 and didn't get its first hit of the regional with a runner in scoring position until down to its final out in the final game. Prior to that, Vanderbilt started the regional 0-for-14 with runners in scoring position.
Bad luck. Bad at-bats. Bad swings. Bad everything.
Such a thorough humbling for the tournament's No. 1 overall seed, while stunning, would've been even more so if it didn't continue a rough narrative for the home team.
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This NCAA Tournament is no longer the Commodores' playground. It's now their house of horrors.
Since losing in the College World Series' final game in 2021, Vanderbilt has failed to make it out of an opening regional for four consecutive years and counting. Its record in NCAA games the past three years is 2-6 (four losses were at Hawkins Field) and there are losses to Xavier, High Point and Wright State.
Last season's 0-for-2 showing in an NCAA regional (including that High Point loss) seemed a turning point for a declining Vanderbilt program that appeared to get its act together in 2025.
These Commodores were a good team that had some good moments. Most notably, they regained control of the in-state rivalry against Tennessee, punctuating it with a blowout win over the Vols in the SEC Tournament. The No. 1 seed was a nice, surprise bonus, too.
But in college baseball, none of it means much without success at the end of the season. And that is when Vanderbilt's baseball program has picked up a habit of shrinking from the challenge.
This was a priceless opportunity to change the narrative by proving otherwise.
Instead, with Vanderbilt's regional embarrassment of 2025, that narrative is stronger than ever. And it's impossible to dispute.
Reach Tennessean sports columnist Gentry Estes at [e-mail] and hang out with him on Bluesky @gentryestes.bsky.social