The No. 7 national seed Louisville baseball team erupted for a seven-run eighth inning on its way to an 11-1 victory against Oklahoma in Saturday night’s NCAA Regional winner’s bracket game at Jim Patterson Stadium.
The Cardinals (49-10) advanced to their sixth straight NCAA Regional final, including the fifth consecutive at home, with Saturday’s win. Sunday’s NCAA Regional schedule will begin with the Sooners (35-23) and Xavier (33-26) facing off in an elimination game at 1 p.m., ET, while the winner will advance to the championship round and a meeting against Louisville at 7 p.m.
Louisville and Oklahoma were entrenched in a pitcher’s duel and tied at 1-1 through seven innings before the Cardinals converted four hits into seven runs in the decisive eighth inning, which featured five different pitchers for the Sooners. Louisville sent 12 batters to the plate while matching its highest scoring inning of the season. Saturday’s seventh frame also marked the 25th time this season the Cardinals have scored four or more runs in an inning.
Senior Colin Lyman paced the Louisville offense as the outfielder was 2-for-4 with two RBI and a run scored as the host team finished with an 8-4 edge in hits. Senior Logan Taylor delivered a tie-breaking, two-run single in the eighth before closing the game with three RBI and scoring twice. Colby Fitch added a two-run triple and scored a run, Brendan McKay chipped in with a two-run double and scored once and Josh Stowers doubled and scored twice.
On the mound, senior righty Jake Sparger came out of the bullpen to retire both batters he faced, including one by strikeout, and earn the win to move to 5-1 on the season. He followed McKay, who provided the Cardinals a quality start allowing just one run on three hits with seven strikeouts in 6.1 innings. With those seven strikeouts on Saturday, McKay pushed his career total to 376 and moved into a tie for the all-time lead at Louisville equaling the total achieved by Kyle Funkhouser from 2013-16.
After McKay and Sooners starter Jake Irvin dueled through four scoreless innings to begin the game, Oklahoma was the first to find the scoring column with a run in the fifth inning on a RBI double from Kyle Mendenhall. Domenic DeRenzo coaxed a one-out walk from McKay before Mendenhall sent a 1-1 pitch off the wall in left center for the 1-0 advantage.
The Cardinals answered in the sixth inning after Stowers scored from third on a RBI sacrifice fly to right field by Taylor. Stowers led off by scorching a 1-0 offering from Irvin into left center for his 13th double of the season and moved to third on a sac bunt from Tyler Fitzgerald before scoring after Taylor’s flyball to right field.
Following a scoreless seventh inning, Louisville grasped control as the visiting team in the top of the eighth inning, which started with a walk to Hairston and a single through the right side from Lyman. The Cardinals missed on their first chance at the go-ahead run when Hairston was tagged out at the plate after trying to score from third on a groundball to Oklahoma shortstop Brandon Zaragoza. However, Louisville’s pursuit would not be thwarted as pinch hitter Jake Snider earned a walk from Connor Berry to load the bases before Taylor sent a 0-2 pitch from JB Olson into left center to score Lyman and Stowers for the 3-1 lead.
The Cardinals continued the scoring in the eighth on a two-run triple to right center from Fitch to send Snider and Taylor home. Later in the inning, Hairston was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded to score Fitch before Lyman connected on his second hit of the inning with a two-run single through the right side to plate McKay and Ellis. Louisville closed its scoring with a trio of runs in the ninth inning as McKay doubled down the right field line to score Logan Wyatt and Taylor before reaching home himself on a single to left center by Ellis.
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Garett Wall
Assistant Sports Information Director