No. 11 Vanderbilt at No. 15 Tennessee, Game 2

5th Inning

T5: Braden Holcomb is having himself a great day. He had a two-run home run earlier and now has added a two-out RBI single that scored Riley Nelson, who had gotten to third base on a balk. Vanderbilt 6, Tennessee 2

4th Inning

B4: Cody Bowker maintains the Commodores’ lead and has five strikeouts, one walk, and four hits allowed through four innings. Vanderbilt 5, Tennessee 2

T4: Gotta love it when a batter beats a shift by hitting the ball in the middle of the shift, which is what Riley Nelson does to leadoff the inning and it pays off big time. Braden Holcomb hit a 377-foot home run to right center field, giving Vanderbilt a two-run lead.

Mike Mancini adds a run after a Jonathan Vastine gets on base with a two-out infield single, and Jacob Humphrey is hit by a pitch. That forces Tennessee into a pitching change after just 3.2 innings. Brandon Arvidson is the new pitcher for Tennessee and escapes the inning with a strikeout and runners at second and third base.

Side note: There has been some rain coming down at the stadium, but not enough to stop play. Vanderbilt 5, Tennessee 2

3rd Inning

B3: Cody Bowker looking solid on the mound for Vanderbilt. Just had his first three up, three down inning and has four strikeouts in the game. Tennessee 2, Vanderbilt 2

T3: Vanderbilt is 3-for-3 on stolen base attempts, including two steals of third base. Just like in the first inning, Jacob Humphrey steals third and scores the tying run on a Rustan Rigdon groundout. Tennessee 2, Vanderbilt 2

2nd Inning

B2: Fairly quick inning from Bowker. Took him four pitches to get the first two outs before giving up a single and then a fly out to end the inning. Tennessee 2, Vanderbilt 1

T2: I wrote about how Marcus Phillips may not be as good as Liam Doyle, but he’s still good enough to cause problems for Vanderbilt at the plate.

It’s still early, but Phillips struck out the first two batters he faced and got a groundout to end the inning. Tennessee 2, Vanderbilt 1

1st Inning

B1: Tennessee’s Hunter Ensley is having himself a fantastic series. He had three highlight reel catches to rob Vanderbilt of runs last night and today, he hits a one-out, two-run home run (Cody Bowker walked the second batter faced) in his first at-bat.

So, maybe it’s not the uniforms. Tennessee 2, Vanderbilt 1

T1: Is it the uniforms? Vanderbilt wore the white with black pin stripes last night and we know how that game went. Today, they’re wearing the amazing black with gold pin stripes uniform (I’m still looking for a better looking baseball uniform) and already got one run (via an impressive stolen-base-trip around the bases by Rustan Rigdon and RJ Austin got an RBI groundout). Vanderbilt 1, Tennessee 0

Pregame

Taylor Hodges here once again for Vanderbilt-Tennessee’s second game of their weekend series. I remember watching Marcus Phillips pitch for Tennessee against Ole Miss earlier this season and thought he looked good. But the Rebels were able to force him out of the game in the fourth inning and went on to win 10-8. Can the Commodores duplicate that today? We’ll find out soon enough. First pitch is coming up soon.