The Vanderbilt Baseball team won two of three @ LSU last weekend with freshmen Jayden Davis and Braden Holcomb having major weekends at the plate. Jayden was named SEC player of the week for his prolific hitting last weekend. Braden cranked two long ones Saturday and Carter Holton was exceptional on the hill. Will have more stats coming up after this weekend. We run-ruled MTSU on Tuesday, 14-1.
Our No.7 team now heads to College Station to square off with the third ranked Texas A&M Aggies (Both rankings are D1 Baseball.com rankings).
We are now 26-7 and 8-4 in the SEC in second place in the SEC East behind Kentucky, which is 11-1 in the conference and 27-5 overall. Kentucky is ranked 8th by D-1. We face them in May in the last series of the season @ Lexington.
A&M is 29-4 overall and 8-4 in the conference, behind No.1 ranked (nationally) Arkansas in the west. The Razorbacks are 11-1 in conference and 29-3 overall. We do not play Arkansas in the regular season.
Loved what we got from our team after a tough game Friday Night with 8-6 and 13-3 victories on Friday and Saturday, games 2 and 3, respectively.
This Friday's game commences at 6 PM CT on SEC Network+, Saturday's game is at 7:30 PM CT on the SEC Network and Sunday's game begins at 1 PM CT on SEC Network+.
The way the rotation has worked out with these Thursday games, Holton has been moved to Saturdays and Sundays, game 3 games. I loved what I saw out of freshman Ethan McElvain last Friday Night. Ethan is a complete stud hitting mid 90's with great off speed stuff. Would love to see him pitch Saturday if Corbs and Brownie choose to go that route. With Ethan and the great Holton, that's stellar weekend pitching. But we'll need a third guy to step up. We still have Greyson Carter and Bryce Cunningham as potential starters Friday and Saturday, but both struggled last weekend in Baton Rouge, so there could be some shakeup. Like both pitchers a lot, they've both been excellent a lot of the season, so fine with them starting. But would personally love to see Ethan get a shot. Will let you know if there is any announcement on our weekend starters. Coach Corbin likes to keep that confidential, so we'll probably have to wait till Friday and Saturday Nights to find out. Will keep you apprised through the weekend. Huge series for our team.
Loved what we did last weekend at Baton Rouge after a tough Thursday Night. We've got our momentum back. Love the competitive spirit of this team.
Our Vanderbilt Men's Golf team won the Mason Rudolph Championship played at our home course the Vanderbilt Legends Club South Course in Franklin last weekend. That was our fifth straight victory in the tournament.
The great Gordon Sargent came back with a vengeance and was special winning top individual honors. Gordon was named SEC Golfer of the week for his effort. Everybody played well. Jackson Van Paris, Cole Sherwood, Matthew Riedel and William Moll all contributed heavily in our victory. So, great stuff from Coach Limbaugh and the guys.
Next up for our No.3 Dores are the SEC Championships Wednesday, April 24th through Sunday April 28th at the Sea Island Golf Club Seaside Course in St. Simon's Island, GA.
The first three rounds will be stroke play with the top eight scoring stroke play teams competing in Match Play Saturday and Sunday. Saturday will feature the quarter and semifinals and the Championship match will take place on Sunday. The SEC Network will televise the championship match Sunday. Will keep you posted for sure on our guys.
Clark got another key commitment this week when when 5.7, 3-star (Rivals, highest three-star ranking) Austin Howard committed. Austin is a 6'3", 225 pound linebacker. Clark will use him both inside and outside. Austin is from Bartlett, TN. in the western part of the state, 10 miles from Memphis. He joined 5.7, 3 star safety Carson Lawrence, who is from McCallie School in Chattanooga. Carson is 6'2", 185. Both players are all over the field, they're hitters and Carson posted 4 ints last season. Austin was active piling up the sacks and TFLs. Like what we have in those two guys. Good start to the 2025 class.
Our team is in the middle of spring drills and I really like quarterbacks Nate Johnson and Diego Pavia. Nate is practicing and showed a lot of talent at Utah the past two seasons. He'll be good for us. Diego, from New Mexico State, will join us this summer, and he was awesome in dominating Auburn last season @Auburn. New Mexico State transfer quarterback Blaze Berlowitz, along with Pavia, is making some nice throws in the spring and possesses a cannon for an arm. Drew Dickey, a rising junior, who has shown a lot of loyalty to the program when others have transferred, definitely deserves a shot. So, I like our QB situation.
O line is still working towards getting their chemistry down, but there's great size and strength, just need some more development, which is what spring and summer are for. And I like our skill players and our defense. I think we're going to have a strong D with CJ Taylor and company doin' some serious work on Saturdays.
Game 1 at First Bank Stadium in Nashvegas, the renovated First Bank Stadium, is Virginia Tech on Saturday, August 31st. No time has been announced yet. Will keep you posted on that. Can't wait to see what team 4 under Clark looks like.
Coach Mark Byington has added two transfers with former James Madison 6'8" power forward Jaylen Carey and Virginia Tech 6'7" wing Tyler Nickel joining the fold. Like what I'm seeing and reading about both guys.
We have some guys in the portal, including T Lawrence, Colin Smith, Paul Lewis, Jason Rivera-Torres and Carter Lang, but they are all considering their options and could return. All of them except for Lee Dort, who has transferred to Cal-Berkley.
So Coach Byington wants to keep those guys along with Isaiah West, who has massive potential, "JQ" Roberts, Malik Presley, two players who I'm real high on who really came on at the end of the season, Jordan Williams and the great Ven-Allen Lubin. We also signed three freshmen: 6'2", 180 point guard Karris Bilal from Atlanta, 6'0, 160 point guard Tyler Tanner from Brentwood, TN. and 6'11", 210 center Jamie Vinson from Oak Hill Academy in Mouth of Wilson, Virginia, a very fine program traditionally in the country.
I think one of Coach Byington's major strengths is development of his roster. I'm excited to see what he does with this coming year's group. Think we've got a shot to be playing significant games next March. Love our new coach.
Will check back soon. Have an awesome weekend and Anchor Down.