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Arkansas coach Dave Van Horn recaps big SEC Tournament win over Vanderbilt
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We were treated to a heavyweight bout on Thursday night from Hoover as No. 1 seed Arkansas edged out No. 3 seed Vanderbilt 6-4 to remain unbeaten in the 2021 SEC Tournament.
The win gives the Razorbacks Friday off and punched the team’s ticket to Saturday’s semifinals. Arkansas will now face the winner of Friday’s Ole Miss vs. Vanderbilt game.
Following the game, Dave Van Horn shared his thoughts on the hard-fought win by the Hogs.
“It was a good ball game,” Van Horn said after the game. “Both starters didn’t have it tonight. To speak on Wicklander, he just seemed — he couldn’t locate his fastball like normal.
“He was behind in the count a lot, and he couldn’t land his curveball. He didn’t have good stuff. He fought it a little bit. He gave us 3 2/3, and we just felt it was time to get him. It was just too wild. We hung in there.”
To beat Vanderbilt, Arkansas had to deal with Commodore ace, Kumar Rocker. Something Van Horn believes his team did well.
Following the win, the Razorback coach was asked to share his team’s strategy for dealing with Rocker.
“Well, our plan is to try to keep him in the zone, you know, lay off the high fastball and that hard curveball that he has kind of has downward action – and it’s hard to do,” Van Horn answered. “But our guys did it a few times and it led to them getting ahead in the count. Probably led to a hit here and there and also led to some walks. We got his pitch count out, that’s what we needed to do. It was just super job by the hit by the hitters.
“We knew we were going to get a lot of hits off these guys have such good arms, but you just got to work the count a little bit and you got to come up with a couple of big hits and that’s what we did.”
52.63% caught stealing on the season? Yeah you’re not going to want to run on Casey Opitz ? pic.twitter.com/JVNrstokDU
— College Baseball Hub (@CollegeBSBHub) May 28, 2021
Big spot, bigger hit. @matt_goodheart was ready for it. pic.twitter.com/plzwVuuxhT
— Arkansas Baseball (@RazorbackBSB) May 28, 2021
? 3 IP
? 0 H
? 5 KThe SEC Pitcher of the Year ? @RazorbackBSB @KevinKopps pic.twitter.com/2hpYAwWGjm
— SEC Network (@SECNetwork) May 28, 2021
A graduate of the University of Tennessee, Michael Wayne Bratton oversees the news coverage for Saturday Down South. Michael previously worked for FOX Sports and NFL.com
