by James Stooksbury
It was a beautiful day in Knoxville as the Tennessee Volunteers(34-1, 12-6 SEC) faced the Lipscomb Bison(18-21, 11-7 ASUN) in a midweek showdown.
This matchup would end in the Volunteers coming out with the win by a score of 11-1 in only seven innings.
It was Austin Breedlove who got the start for the Vols, and he started off strong as he quickly worked through the first inning.
The Vols would then head to the plate, and they quickly took the lead, as after a Gavin Kilen single, Andrew Fischer would launch a two-run homer into the Tennessee bullpen.
The scoring in the 1st didn’t stop there for the Vols as after a Hunter Ensley double, Dalton Bargo would single him in from 2nd.
Breedlove would return to the mound for the Vols, and he delivered two more scoreless innings in the 2nd and the 3rd.
When asked about his outing, Breedlove said, “It was good to finally get those couple of innings in a row. Definitely felt a little new on the body, but it’ll get better over time.”
Breedlove’s day would end there as his final stat line would be 3 innings pitched, 0 runs allowed, and 4 strikeouts.
Tennessee would add another run in the bottom of the 3rd as Andrew Fischer would score Dean Curley from 2nd.
It would then be Michael Sharman’s chance on the mound as he would pick up right where Breedlove ended.
He himself would pitch three scoreless innings while minimizing Bison baserunners. Gavin Kilen would say about Sharman after the game, “I thought he really pitched well. I think he always does a good job, just throwing a lot of strikes, doing what he can, and gets a lot of soft contact.”
Tennessee’s offense would pick up another run courtesy of a Gavin Kilen single in the 5th and the Vols wouldn’t stop there.
After Andrew Behnke relieved Sharman in the 7th, he quickly allowed a solo home run to Bison batter Damion Kenealy JR. The Vols would respond in a large way at the bottom of the 7th.
The Vols would hit three two-run homers in the 7th as Hunter Ensley, Cannon Peebles, and Levi Clark helped the Vols reach the mercy rule.
This was a big win for the Vols as it was important to get a win before a huge series down in Baton Rouge this weekend.
When asked about LSU, Tony Vitello said, “Coach Jay Johnson’s got his style of baseball. So you kind of got a few stereotypes you could point out about each program. And obviously they are well-coached. They’ve had success.”
Tennessee will face a huge road test this weekend as they will play the #7 ranked LSU Tigers in a weekend series starting on Friday.