The Buckeye baseball team needed thirteen innings, but it was able to outlast the McNeese State Cowboys in an elimination game of the Nashville Regional of the 2019 NCAA Baseball Tournament Saturday. And as these things go, they would have to wait to see who their opponent would be in another elimination contest until Vanderbilt and Indiana State completed play later in the night.
“Incredibly proud of how our guys fought today,” head coach Greg Beals said. “It wasn’t our cleanest or best baseball game as far as skill, but maybe the best game we’ve played from a culture standpoint. The competitive toughness and the brotherhood and the things that we believe in; we were really good in that area. I’m happy for our guys. I have to comment on the McNeese ball club and the fight that they had. It’s unfortunate that a team has to lose that game and go home. We got a lot out of our guys today and they fought hard. Andrew Magno gave us everything he had and Ridge Winand, our senior captain, gets the game-winning hit. Those are the backend moments that I’m really happy for today.”
We now know that the next hurdle in the way will be Indiana State after the Sycamores dropped a hard-fought contest 8-5 against host Vanderbilt. If Ohio State is to find a way to bottle the magic it has found during the final stretch of the season and get to a Super Regional, it’ll have to not only beat the Sycamores Sunday, but then beat Vandy twice because of losing the first game of the Regional to the SEC Champion.
Game time against Indiana State is set for 3:00 PM Eastern time and can be seen on ESPN3. If OSU can manage to win, it’ll then play about an hour after the end of that contest and matchup against a Vanderbilt team that can flat-out mash the ball on offense.
Go get ’em boys.
