Baylor Baseball is Eliminated from the NCAA Tournament, Losing 4-2 to Stanford

#2 seed Baylor drops its elimination game to #1 seed Stanford, 4-2. Early pitching and batting issues ultimately sealed the Bears fate against the Cardinal who was the #2 team in the country.

Stanford opened the scoring for the day, starting with a two run, two out homer made possible by a preceding two out walk in the bottom of the 1st inning. The score was 2-0 going into the 2nd. Stanford doubled its score in the second inning to put the score at 4-0. The Bears brought in Alex Phillips from the bullpen and stopped the bleeding. He held Stanford scoreless , pitching from the 2nd through 7th innings.

Baylor started getting the bats going in the 5th inning. Davion Downey smashed a solo home run over the right field fence to put the score at 4-1. Then in the 7th inning Shea Langeliers hit another solo shot to move the score to 4-2. Thanks to the strong bullpen pitching, the Bears had a shot. Troy Montemayor came in to pitch in the bottom of the 8th and put three up and three down. Baylor needed two runs in the top of the 9th with the top of the order up to tie the game.

Nick Loftin rocketed a ball way over the left field wall but it was just foul. Loftin still made it to the base on a solid single right at the shortstop. Richard Cunningham stepped to the plate next as the potential tying run. He quickly fouled two balls and was behind in the count 0-2. Cunningham tried to pull the bat back on a ball but on appeal was called struck out. Two outs left for Baylor. Davis Wendzel was up next and opened with three straight balls thrown to him. Wendzel took the next strike to move the count to 3-1. Then Wendzel swung hard at the next pitch to make the count full with 1 out. He fouled another ball to stay alive. But he swung hard again and missed for another strikeout to move the Bears to 2 outs. Andy Thomas made solid contact on the next at bat but it hung too much and was a flyout, ending the Bears’ season.

A tough loss but still a great season for Baylor Baseball who should have a lot to look forward to in the coming seasons. Sic ‘em Baylor Baseball!