Latest news with #Vols'
USA Today
a day ago
- Sport
- USA Today
Tennessee golf hires PGA TOUR winner
Tennessee golf hires PGA TOUR winner Tennessee men's golf announced the hiring of Derek Ernst as the Vols' associate head coach. He played on the PGA TOUR from 2012-24. "I am very excited for Derek to begin his time here on Rocky Top," Tennessee head coach Brennan Webb said. "His experience playing and winning at the highest levels of professional golf, with the best players in the world, will be an incredible asset for the players in our program. "Derek's contagious enthusiasm to pass on all he has learned to the players in our program struck me from our very first conversation. There really is no substitute for Derek's experience in our game and I can't wait for him to get started with the Vols." Ernst (-8) won the 2013 Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow in Charlotte, North Carolina. He defeated David Lynn in a playoff, while Phil Mickelson finished third (-7). Ernst made 134 PGA TOUR starts and recorded five top 25 finishes. Follow Vols Wire on Facebook and X (formerly Twitter).
Yahoo
a day ago
- Sport
- Yahoo
Vols' season comes to an end at the hand of a powerful Arkansas offense
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. (WATE) — Tennessee can't control Arkansas' offense. The Vols' season ends in Game 2 to the Razorbacks 11-4. Arkansas jumped out to a lead in the third inning. Charles Davalan rocketed a ball to right field for his 14th home run of the season. The Razorbacks held a 2-0 lead. 'It always just feels like home': Hendon Hooker draws inspiration from youth football camp in Knoxville Tennessee had the bases loaded in the bottom of the fourth but could only muster up one run on a double-play ball by Andrew Fischer. Liam Doyle only lasted 3.2 innings, surrendering five hits and five earned runs with six strikeouts. Tony Vitello pulled Doyle with the bases loaded in the fourth inning. The head coach gave the ball to Brayden Krenzel. The Razorbacks were able to add a run on a Krenzel wild pitch. Judge requests additional info in Zakai Zeigler case for 5th season on Rocky Top Vitello turned to A.J. Russell after a hit by pitch. Russell served up a grand slam to Logan Maxwell. The Hogs were in full control, 7-1. Arkansas tacked on another run in the seventh inning. Kuhio Aloy singled home Maxwell. The Razorbacks picked up a couple of more runs by walking with the bases loaded. Dean Curley drove in his 51st RBI with a single in the eighth to give Tennessee its second run. Brent Iredale put the hogs back up by nine with his 14th of the season. Jay Abernathy crushed his first career home run for the Vols' final runs of the game. Tennessee finished the season 46-19. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
USA Today
3 days ago
- Sport
- USA Today
Who is Tony Vitello? Meet Tennessee baseball coach ahead of NCAA super regional
Who is Tony Vitello? Meet Tennessee baseball coach ahead of NCAA super regional Show Caption Hide Caption 5 men's NCAA baseball tournament players to watch The Mongomery Advertiser's Adam Cole and The Tennesseean's Aria Gerson break down the top players to watch in the men's NCAA baseball tournament. Tony Vitello has Tennessee baseball two wins away from returning to the College World Series for the second consecutive season, as the Vols look to defend last year's national championship. To get back to Omaha, Vitello will need to lead his program to a super regional win against a program that he once served as an assistant coach for: Arkansas. No. 14 Tennessee and No. 3 Arkansas are set to open up the Fayetteville Super Regional on June 7 at 5 p.m. ET at Baum–Walker Stadium in Fayetteville, Arkansas. REQUIRED READING: NCAA baseball tournament bracket: Super regional matchups, schedule, pairings for CWS Vitello enters the Fayetteville Super Regional against Arkansas holding a 341-129 overall record during his tenure at Tennessee. Tennessee, the lower seed in the Fayetteville Super Regional, is 106-72 overall against ranked teams under Vitello. Here's what to know about Vitello ahead of the Fayetteville Super Regional: Who is Tony Vitello? Tony Vitello is the skipper of Tennessee baseball, a position that he has held since 2018. He's also one of the top coaches in college baseball. He is the lone coach to have led Tennessee to a College World Series national title, which the Vols earned last season with a 2-1 series win against Texas A&M. The Vols' win over the Aggies ended a 25-year-long curse of the No. 1 overall seed not winning the NCAA baseball tournament. "Kids are tough these days. They will do what you ask them to do," Vitello said after the Vols' CWS title win. "I know our fans got us through that tough inning. That was a group effort on the mound. If you're in the SEC, you're going to be a superstar player, but you need to be a good teammate, and that's what these guys were." Since taking over on Rocky Top, Vitello has transformed the Tennessee baseball program into one of the top programs in the country, and a consistent one at that. Vitello made Tennessee history during the Vols' 5-1 win over Samford back in February, as he became the fastest coach in program history to reach 300 wins. The Fayetteville Super Regional marks the fifth consecutive super regional that the Vols have appeared in under Vitello, who has led Tennessee to six straight NCAA Tournaments. To put into perspective the impact Vitello has had on the program in the postseason, the Vols had a postseason drought that dated back to 2005 before he took over in 2017. As noted by Tennessee's game notes for the Fayetteville Super Regional, the 257 victories that Vitello has led the Vols to since 2021 are the most of any team in the country and 29 wins ahead of Arkansas. He's led the Vols to the SEC regular season and SEC tournament championships twice in his tenure, first in 2022 and then in 2024. Did Tony Vitello coach at Arkansas? Yes, Vitello spent four years on the bench at Arkansas as one of Dave Van Horn's assistant coaches. Vitello held his spot on Van Horn's staff from 2014-17 and served as the Razorbacks' hitting coach and recruiting coordinator. Noted in Vitello's Tennessee profile, Arkansas averaged nearly 38 wins in the four seasons he was with the Razorbacks. He helped Arkansas to three seasons of at least 40 wins and a 2015 College World Series appearance. "(Vitello's) a really a big-time competitor. He likes to compete at everything he does, whether it's shooting baskets, free throws, it doesn't matter," Van Horn told reporters of Vitello on June 6. "He grew up that way. His dad's a high school coach. He was always, as a young kid, always with his dad's teams and all the way to JUCO to Missouri, playing. In his coaching career, he's very competitive on the recruiting trail and everything else. So that's what it takes to have success at this level." Tony Vitello coaching history, record Vitello got his start in coaching at the Power 4 conference level at his alma mater, Missouri from 2003 through 2010. He then joined now-Texas coach Jim Schlossnagle's staff at TCU ahead of the 2011 college baseball season. He'd spend three seasons with the Horned Frogs as an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator before joining Van Horn's staff at Arkansas. He was hired as Tennessee's coach, his first head coaching stint, on June 7, 2017. Here's a year-by-year breakdown of how Tennessee has fared under Vitello:
USA Today
29-05-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Tennessee softball: How hard does Vols' star pitcher Karlyn Pickens throw?
Tennessee softball: How hard does Vols' star pitcher Karlyn Pickens throw? Show Caption Hide Caption Texas Tech's NiJaree Canady and Tennessee's Karlyn Pickens lead WCWS players to watch The Oklahoman's Jenni Carlson highlights several Women's College World Series key players to watch. Tennessee softball begins its seventh appearance in the Women's College World Series against a familiar program, which also happens to be the sport's biggest titan: Oklahoma. The Vols, however, have already had one successful swing at taking down college softball's Goliath this season, as they took the regular season head-to-head series against the Sooners. It was just one of three SEC regular-season series losses that Oklahoma, which is looking for its fifth straight national championship, had. A big reason for the Vols' regular-season success was their star junior pitcher Karlyn Pickens, who Tennessee will need to beat the Sooners on Thursday at 2:30 p.m. ET at Devon Park in Oklahoma City. REQURIED READING: WCWS bracket 2025: Full schedule, matchups for NCAA softball tournament In that three-game weekend series back in March in Norman, Pickens went 2-0 in 12 2/3 innings of work and struck out 12 Sooners' hitters while giving up just four runs on 10 hits and three walks. The success the back-to-back SEC Pitcher of the Year had against OU is a small snippet of the dominance that she has showcased this entire season inside the circle for the Vols. A top-10 finalist for the USA Softball Player of the Year award, Pickens put Tennessee on her back in the Knoxville Super Regional vs. Nebraska with back-to-back complete game performances to win the series. But as fans watch the Vols play for their first WCWS national title with Pickens in the circle, one thing will stand out above all the skills that the North Carolina native has while pitching: how hard she pitches. Here's what you need to know on how hard Pickens throws inside the circle: How fast does Tennessee softball's Karlyn Pickens throw? In short, very, very, very fast — like literally so fast. In Game 1 of the Knoxville Super Regional, the Vols' right-hander showed that she has more gas in the tank to showcase, as she set a new NCAA record for fastest pitch recorded with a 79.4 mph fastball on the seventh pitch of a first-inning at-bat against Nebraska's Jordy Bahl. Bahl, who is one of the other top pitchers in the country, would foul off the pitch. As noted by the Big Ten Network's Sydney Supple, Pickens' near 80 mph pitch gave Bahl (or any batter) a reactionary time of .341 of a second to pick up and swing at the pitch. The distance from the rubber on the pitcher's mound to home plate is 43 feet. Pickens' flame-throwing pitch against the Cornhuskers broke her previous NCAA record of 78.2 mph, which she set back in March against Arkansas. Prior to setting the record against Arkansas in SEC play, Pickens had been tied with former Tennessee pitcher Monica Abbott for the fastest pitch in NCAA history, a record that Abbott held for 13 years. "She's definitely in a league of her own," Abbott recently told Knox News, part of the USA TODAY Network, on Pickens. Abbott added: "Some people were like, 'Oh, man, RIP to your record.' And I was like, 'Not really – like hell yeah, look at our sport.' I held that record for 10-plus years ... And we got someone that's just a junior in college breaking it? That's incredible." REQUIRED READING: There's more to Tennessee flamethrower Karlyn Pickens than the fastest pitch ever in softball Karlyn Pickens softball stats Pickens enters the WCWS with a 24-9 record and a 1.00 ERA in 204 innings of work in the circle this season. She has recorded a career-high 280 strikeouts while throwing 22 complete games, two of which came in the Knoxville Super Regional vs. Nebraska. Her 1.00 ERA in the circle this season leads all Tennessee pitchers and ranks second in the country, only behind Texas Tech's NiJaree Canady's 0.89 ERA. Here's a game-by-game breakdown of Pickens' stats this season in the NCAA softball tournament:
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Vols ace Liam Doyle named SEC Pitcher of the Year
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WATE) — Tennessee baseball ace Liam Doyle was named the SEC Pitcher of the Year after leading the nation in strikeouts with 137. Doyle becomes the third pitcher in program history to earn the award and the second in the last four years. Doyle joins Chase Dollander, who won the award in 2022, and Luke Hochevar, who was named the winner in 2005. Lady Vols sweep regional to advance to third straight Super Doyle has been the most consistent pitcher in the Vols' rotation. The junior had a 2.72 ERA in 79.1 innings pitched during the regular season. Doyle has won SEC Pitcher of the Week three times this season. He is also a Golden Spikes Award Semifinalist. Three Vol Baseball players named semifinalists for the Dick Howser Trophy Tennessee is just the third school in the conference to have three or more players win the SEC Pitcher of the Year. LSU has four and Vanderbilt has three. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
