Nationals Arm Race

UCLA Wins the 2013 College World Series.

To recap the entire NCAA post-season tournament with links to my previous posts:

• Here’s my look at the Field of 64.
• Here’s a review of the First round and a look at the Super Regionals.
• Here’s a review of the Super Regionals and the CWS field with predictions.
• Here’s a look at the first four days of the CWS.
• Here’s a look at the rest of the CWS bracket play and a finals preview.

CWS Finals:

• Game 1: UCLA’s #1/Friday starter Adam Plutko pitched 6 innings of solid one-run ball and the Bruins got just enough from the Trevor Fitts/Chad Girodo Mississippi State combo starter offering to take the first game 3-1 (box/gamer).  Plutko, an 11th round pick by Cleveland, wasn’t overly dominant (just 2 strikeouts) but was effective and the UCLA bullpen shut down the Bulldog offense.
• Game 2: UCLA’s #2/Saturday starter Nick Vander Tuig completed the two-game sweep with 8 shut-out innings while Mississippi State’s rotational depth issues were exposed badly.  UCLA battered the bullpen-by-committee efforts and won the game and championship with ease 8-0.

UCLA just had the better pitching.  Mississippi State’s missing friday starter and then the subsequent burning of their saturday starter (best remaining starter) to get to the final ended up costing them dearly.

Not a good sign when you can’t spell the name of your marquee event correctly.

Here’s a recap of the 2013 College World Series (CWS) so far.  We’re through the first four days of competition and we’re getting closer to a CWS final.

To recap the entire NCAA post-season tournament so far

• Here’s my look at the Field of 64.
• Here’s a review of the first round and a look at the Super Regionals.
• Here’s a review of the Super Regionals and the CWS field with predictions.

A couple helpful resources for those who want to follow the College game: here’s a link to the CWS schedule page at d1baseball.com, which I use as the best way to quickly find all the core college site data.  And here’s the best (only?) College Baseball blog out there: CollegeBaseballDaily.com.

CWS Field: here’s the two Pots that will each determine a finalist:

• Pot 1: UNC, NC State, UCLA, LSU
• Pot 2: Mississippi State, Oregon State, Indiana, Louisville

Days 1-2:

• Results: NC State beats UNC, UCLA beats LSU, Mississippi State beats Oregon State and Indiana beats Louisville.  My predictions were pretty bad; all four teams that I thought would win the openers lost; only Indiana-Louisville would not have been considered an “upset” by seeds.
• Carlos Rodon for NC State pitched a complete game victory, giving up just one run on 5 hits against the #1 overall seed UNC.  Rodon’s post-season stats now stand as follows: 26 1/3 innings, 18 hits, 4 runs, 27Ks, 4 walks.  Hie continues building his draft pedigree for 2014 (he’s already considered one of the best, if not the best 2014 draft prospects).  If NC State can beat UCLA, they’ll get Rodon in the pot final on 4 days rest and could use him in game 3 of the finals on 4 days rest as well, an intruiging scenario for NC State’s chances at winning this tournament.  So instead of seeing marquee matchups in the winners brackets of both pots, we saw them in win-or-go-home games in the Losers bracket.
• Aaron Nola for LSU took his first loss of the season, giving up 2 unearned runs in 8 innings to lose to UCLA.  Another upper-end sophomore pitching prospect, Nola has yet to give up an earned run in the post season and previously out-dueled 3rd overall pick Jonathan Grey in the super Regional by pitching a 2-hit shutout against Oklahoma.  But UCLA ground out an important victory.
• Mississippi State scored twice in the 8th to take the 5-4 lead and held on against #3 overall Seed Oregon State.
• Joey DeNato pitched a 4-hit shutout for Indiana and shut down Louisville.  DeNato is a college junior who (amazingly?) went undrafted in June (likely because of his size; he’s listed as 5’10” 180 and probably is smaller).   He’s 24-8 for his college career and is only improving.  He could be a draft day find for someone in 2014.

Days 3-4:

• Results: Oregon State eliminates Louisville, Mississippi State beats Indiana, UNC eliminates LSU, and UCLA beats NC State.
• Louisville is the first team eliminated as their ace Jeff Thompson (a third round 2013 pick for Detroit) gets pounded for 7 runs in 3 2/3 innings.  Not a great way to end your college career.
• Mississippi State puts itself in the driver’s seat to advance from Pot 2 with another 8th inning come-back to beat Indiana and now only needs one more win to get to the CWS final.
• LSU, the team that I thought would win the CWS a few days ago, became the 2nd team to be eliminated by falling to #1 overall seed UNC.  Tar Heels freshman “Closer” Trent Thornton got the start and threw 7 decent innings to improve to 12-1 on the season.  The Tarheel’s offense got to LSU’s starter early to send my (and Baseball America pundits’) favorite home early.
• UCLA put itself in the drivers seat of Pot 1 by beating NC State 2-1.  UCLA’s saturday starter Nick Vander Tuig (and San Francisco’s 6th round pick this year) junk-balled his way through 7 innings of 4-hit ball for the victory.

Where do we stand in the tournament now/What’s next?

• The next two days feature Elimination games.
• Oregon State-Indiana is tonight 6/19/13.  Loser goes home.  The winner has to beat Mississippi State twice to get to the CWS Final.
• UNC faces NC State for the 5th time this season tomorrow night 6/20/13.  Loser goes home.  The winner has to then beat UCLA twice to get to the CWS final.
• UCLA and Mississippi State are both heavily favored at this point to advance; they get to rest their bullpens and they can throw their #1 starters on full rest.