Alabama took down St. John’s 7-2 on Monday, completing a sweep of the Tuscaloosa Super Regional and earning its first trip to the College World Series since 1999.
“Man, what a day, what a year, what a season,” head coach Rob Vaughn said. “27 years in the making, man, and I couldn’t think of a better group to be able to kick that door down. So, man. I don’t even have words. This group’s been through a lot this year. And, man they met the moment the last few weeks. They just, when the moment got big, they showed up.”
Center fielder Bryce Fowler, shortstop Justin Lebron and catcher Brady Neal went three up, three down in the top of the first inning.
Crimson Tide starting pitcher Zane Adams worked a nice and easy 1-2-3 bottom of the first inning with a pair of strikeouts.
The Crimson Tide kicked off the scoring in the top half of the third inning. First baseman Luke Vaughn led off with a double into the right field corner, and right fielder Peyton Stele followed with an RBI single. Then Fowler laced a double into the left-center gap to put two runners in scoring position. Neal extended the Crimson Tide’s lead to 2-0 via an RBI groundout.
The Red Storm responded with a run of their own in the bottom half of the inning thanks to an RBI groundout from Jon LeGrande.
In the top of the fourth inning, the Crimson Tide got that run right back with a perfectly placed safety squeeze from Vaughn to make it a 3-1 game. In the bottom half of the frame, Adams picked up a flyout and a strikeout to strand two runners in scoring position and work a shutdown inning.
The Red Storm cut the Crimson Tide’s lead to one run in the bottom of the sixth inning with a solo shot into the bullpen from Adam Agresti.
Then, in the top half of the seventh inning, Steele and Fowler legged out infield singles and Neal worked a walk to load the bases with two outs for third baseman Jason Torres. Torres delivered the biggest swing of his life, launching a grand slam into the Right Field Ragers to extend the Crimson Tide’s lead to 7-2.
“I mean, honestly, I was just trying to put the ball in play because the day before, I was kind of getting blown away by 90 miles an hour,” Torres said. “So I was trying to just put a fastball in play. I knew I was going to get one, and I did, and it went out. Honestly, it was fun.”
Designated hitter John Lemm worked a walk and had a bat flip, leading to things getting a little heated, but the umpires were able to calm tensions down.
Adams came back out for the bottom of the seventh inning and picked up a strikeout, then surrendered a single to end his day. Left-hander Matthew Heiberger took over for the fellow left-hander Adams and induced a 1-6-3 inning-ending double play.
Adams, in what will be his final start in front of the Crimson Tide faithful, left the mound to a well-deserved standing ovation. Adams tossed 6.1 innings, allowing six hits, two runs, didn’t walk anybody and struck out eight on 111 pitches.
After a five-hour weather delay, NCAA officials decided that field conditions were too poor to resume play on Sunday and suspended play until 11 a.m. CT on Monday. Heiberger came back out to pitch the bottom of the eighth and navigated around a two-out base hit and a hit batsman to work a scoreless frame.
Heiberger came back out for the bottom of the ninth and worked a 1-2-3 inning to clinch a historic win for the Crimson Tide.
“Getting to come here and go to Omaha with the team that I watched since I was a kid, you can’t write it up any better than that,” Adams said.
The Crimson Tide will take on Oklahoma on Saturday at 2 p.m. CT at Charles Schwab Field on ESPN.
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