June 16, 2009

Game 8 Notes

College World Series Capsules

College World Series Schedule and Game Stories

Rupp, Rupp and Away

By Phil Stanton

CollegeBaseballInsider.com Co-Founder
 

OMAHA, Neb. – In a game that we thought would be dominated by the starting pitchers, a catcher stepped up.

Sophomore Cameron Rupp homered the other way twice as Texas scored 10 unanswered runs in a 10-6 victory over Arizona State in the College World Series in front of 24,152 fans at Rosenblatt Stadium.

The fifth-seeded Sun Devils (50-13) will face fourth-seeded North Carolina on Thursday at 6 p.m. CT in an elimination game. That winner must defeat the top-seeded Longhorns (48-14-1) on both Friday and Saturday to advance to the championship series.

“For the team to find a way to win was nothing short of a miracle,” Texas head coach Augie Garrido said. “It was quite a performance. It was rough and it was ugly, but it got done.”

The two starting pitchers, Mike Lease of ASU and Chance Ruffin of UT, were a combined 26-3, but both were gone by the end of the fourth.

Kole Calhoun of ASU snapped the scoreless tie with a leadoff homer in the bottom of the second, his 11th and second in the CWS. Matt Newman has a one-out single, moved to third on a base hit by Raoul Torrez and scored on a passed ball. Torrez came in on a single by Jared McDonald to make it 3-0.

Carlos Ramirez went deep for the 19th time to spark a three-run third as the Sun Devils built a 6-0 lead and sent Ruffin to the dugout. An error by UT second baseman Travis Tucker led to two unearned runs.

“I actually looked at my glove and was talking to it,” Tucker said, “like ‘What are you doing?’ It wasn’t my fault, it was totally my glove’s fault. I had to talk to it, settle it down a little bit, but we talked through things.”

Garrido talked with the team in the dugout at the end of the third.

“He told us how good it’s going to feel to come back and win this game,” Tucker said. “We’re down so far, we’re not going to give up, and how good it’s going to feel.

The Longhorns would not give up. Rupp belted a three-run dinger to right in the fourth, his ninth, to cut the lead in half. Travis Tucker had a RBI bunt single and Brandon Belt added a two-run base hit to chase Leake and tie the game at 6-6, turning the decision over to the bullpens.

Rupp went deep again leading off the seventh to put the Longhorns on top 7-6. It was his first career mulit-homer game. Texas added three insurance runs in the eighth as Kevin Keyes had an RBI double and Brandon Loy added a two-run single to give UT a 10-6 advantage.

Taylor Jungmann (10-3) finished the game for the Longhorns, going 5.2 innings with two hits, one walk and six strikeouts. He retired 10 of the final 11 Sun Devils to preserve the victory.

Ruffin allowed seven hits in two innings with six runs, four earned, one walk and three strikeouts. Leake worked 3.1 innings with eight hits, six runs, five earned, two walks and five strikeouts. Both hurlers had the shortest starts of the season.

“They got timely hitting,” Leake said. “I wasn’t locating as well as I could.”

Tucker went 3 for 4 with two runs and one RBI for Texas. Loy also had two hits and two RBI for the Longhorns.

Calhoun finished 3 for 4 with two runs for Arizona State.

“First and foremost, the credit goes to Texas,” ASU head coach Pat Murphy said. “They did a great job of getting back in this ballgame. It was 6-0 after three. With Mike Leake on the mound and a six-run lead, we were feeling pretty good about things. But that just shows you how beautiful our game is and how beautiful college baseball is and how great this event is. The best teams are here, the best team tonight fought back and won the game.”