Ugly Loss for Tulane Baseball vs South Florida, 16-6
22-runs, 28-hits between Tulane and South Florida Friday night and most of both belonged to the Bulls from Tampa in a 16-6 route of the Green Wave in Turchin Stadium. The loss drops the Wave to 8-14 in American Conference play and in sole possession of the 10th slot out of ten teams. Only the top eight squads will make it to the league post-season tournament next week.
Things started out well for TU. The Wave jumped out to a 3-nothing lead in the bottom of the first when designated hitter Mathias Haas slapped a three-run bomb over the left field fence. For the next two innings, not much going for either the Bulls or the Wave. Then came the fourth and fifth.
South Florida scored three runs in the top of the fourth and four more in the top of the fifth to chase starter J.D. Rodriguez. Though the Green Wave was able to scratch out three more runs in the fifth, the Bulls turned on the jets, scoring three runs in the seventh, two more in the eighth, and four more in the ninth.
"They (his team) embarrassed the program," coach Jay Uhlman said when asked what he told his players at game's end. "Tonight was old guys, guys that had been around, (having) a lack of energy. It started great, then we got punched (South Florida scoring in the fourth and fifth), then we punched back, got it close. Then they got another big number. I said to them, (it looked like) we wanted it to be over. (Like) we wanted to go home."
The bottom of the sixth told the tale of this story. After a Tanner Chun leadoff walk, senior Kaikea Harrison failed to bunt him over to second on two attempts, then came up empty looking at a third strike. Chun had taken off on the pitch to steal second and got there safely, but over slid the bag and was tagged out for a gut punch of a double play.
"It was a microcosm of the season," Uhlman told us. "It was (our season) in a nutshell, that play in itself."
Things got out of hand late, as the Wave piled up three errors in the game, two of them in the top of the ninth when South Florida scored four unanswered runs to give them their 10-run margin.
"100% (lack of focus)," Uhlman said. "No excuse for that, but 100% that's what it was."
We asked Uhlman about his team's reaction when adversity has arisen.
"Where the ebbs and flows of the game are working against you," he told us, "you have to be tougher mentally: in your heart and in your soul. That it is going to drive you to be more competitive. I think people make choices between being real competitive or choosing not to. Obviously, the end result (tonight) was the latter."
Senior designated hitter Matthias Haas was asked afterwards what the senior leadership can do to help the team move on.
"I think it's a...thing in baseball to have a short-term memory," Haas said. "It starts on how we show up tomorrow, the pre-game prep, our mentality through the game. This game gives you nothing, so you've got to give it everything you've got."
Game two of the series is set for 6:30 p.m. Saturday night at Turchin Stadium. No pitcher has been named a starter for either team.
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Doug has covered a gamut of sporting events in his fifty-plus years in the field. He started doing sideline reporting for Louisiana Tech football games for the student radio station. Doug was Sports Director for KNOE-AM/FM in Monroe in the mid-80s, winning numerous awards from the Louisiana Sports Writers Association for Best Sportscast and Best Play-by-Play. High school play-by-play for teams in Monroe, Natchitoches, New Orleans, and Thibodaux, LA dot his resume. He did college play-by-play for Northwestern State University in Natchitoches for nine years. Then, moving to the Crescent City, Doug did television PBP of Tulane games and even filled in for legendary Tulane broadcaster, Ken Berthelot in the only game Kenny ever missed while doing the Green Wave games. His father was an alumnus of Tulane in the 1940s, so Doug has attended Tulane football games in old Tulane Stadium, the Superdome, and Yulman. He was one of the 86,000 plus on December 1, 1973, sitting in the North End Zone to seeTulane shutout the LSU Tigers, 14-0. He was there when the Posse ruled Fogelman and in Turchin when the Wave made it to the World Series. He currently is the public address voice of the Tulane baseball team.