HOOVER, AL – Tennessee baseball has developed a dangerous habit of falling behind early.
In the second round of the SEC Tournament, it led to the Vols getting sent home.
Arkansas tagged Tennessee starting pitcher Evan Blanco for four first-inning runs and the 10th-seeded Vols couldn’t recover, seeing their SEC Tournament stay end with an 8-4 loss to the No. 7 seed Razorbacks (37-19) on May 20 at the Hoover Met.
Blanco (7-4, 5.29 ERA), pitching on short rest after starting five days prior at Oklahoma, was relieved after allowing five runs in three innings.
“They were sitting on pitches and they landed on them,” Vols coach Josh Elander said. “And some of those were hit a long way,” referencing the three 420-plus-foot home runs Arkansas hit off Blanco.
The rough first inning was a continuation of a concerning recent trend for the No. 25 Vols (38-20). In their final regular season series at Oklahoma, they faced a deficit of at least 3-0 every game. In their last nine games against SEC competition, they’ve only won the first inning twice and have been outscored in the opening frame by a combined 23-9.
From the second inning on in that span, Tennessee has a scoring margin of plus-20, winning the last eight innings of those nine games 58-38.
“I think at this point in the year, we’ve been through the mud and had some – we’ve won a lot of different ways and lost some different ways,” Elander said. “I want our guys to buy in that there’s nine innings.”
Blanco in particular has needed time to settle into his last three starts, which all came in a 12-day span. The senior gave up at least three runs in the first inning in all those starts, while Elander attributed in part to the heavy workload lessening the sharpness of Blanco’s off-speed pitches.
It is not an entirely Blanco-exclusive trend, though. While sophomore ace Tegan Kuhns has generally avoided early damage of late, the Vols’ starter didn’t even make it out of the first inning in either of the games Landon Mack was scheduled to start but missed due to arm soreness. Mack’s status for the NCAA Tournament is still uncertain, with Elander saying on May 20 he expects to have a better feel by early next week.
A potent lineup that has rounded into form down the stretch of the season has helped make up many of those early deficits, and the Vols have continued to show their resilience when playing from behind. Even in the loss to Arkansas, they got within two before the Razorbacks pulled back further ahead. Second baseman Blake Grimmer said the key has been “trusting our guys, knowing we can score as much as we’ve let up.”
But the margin for error in a regional is very slim, and as Tennessee saw against Arkansas, relying on a comeback is a risky proposition. A slow start can upend a tournament run fast.
Emmett Siegel covers Tennessee baseball for Knox News. Email: emmett.siegel@knoxnews.com; X: @EmmettSiegel_
This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Tennessee baseball keeps going down early. Can the Vols come back in NCAA Tournament?
