It will be Arkansas’ Root vs. Tennessee’s Phillips in game one of the Super Regional

BY DUDLEY E. DAWSON

FAYETTEVILLE – Arguably the most anticipated of the eight NCAA Tournament Super Regionals will get underway Saturday at Baum-Walker Stadium Fayetteville on Saturday.

No. 3 Arkansas (46-13), the top remaining national seed left in the field, will take on defending national champion Tennessee (46-17) at 4 p.m.

It’s the first game in a best two of three-series format with a Sunday game set for 2 p.m, and a game three if necessary on Monday at time to be determined.

The first two games will be televised by ESPN.

“Welcome to Fayetteville,” Arkansas head coach Dave Van Horn said at his Friday press conference. Just excited to be playing. What a great match this should be.

“And I think after tomorrow morning the weather is supposed to be great so it should be an exciting weekend.”

Playing in a Saturday-Sunday -Monday instead of beginning on Friday gave Tennessee an extra days rest, but also Arkansas one as well. 

“That’s fine with us,” Van Horn said. “We didn’t care either way. But it’s probably a good thing, probably for both teams, honestly.”

Tennessee head coach and former Arkansas assistant Tony Vitello knows his team is walking into a great atmosphere where Arkansas has won a school-record 35 games at home this season.

“It is incredibly unique when you take the whole country into account and then it is unique in the conference, which that is a lot to say,” Vitello said.

“But from my experience, and I wasn’t here last weekend, but I would bank on it that it changes in the post season.

“We are in process of adding seats and trying to get to the caliber of SEC stadiums and we’ll be fortunate to (athletic director) Danny White and the administration.

“…That’s why these guys consider it special and a blessing to compete in this environment.”

Arkansas pitcher Gabe Gaeckle is thrilled to be playing at home again this weekend.

“Yeah, it’s special,” Gaeckle said. “The best fans in the country. It’s nice to have 12, 13,000 rooting for you. Super grateful to be playing in front of these crowds and it’s going to be a fun weekend.

Van Horn was asked how he has tried to drown out to noise surrounding the highly-anticipated match up.

“Talked a lot about it last week, and then after the game we talked about it as a staff, and then we talked about it with the team, each practice, maybe just a little bit.

“Maybe mention it again today, make sure you got everything taken care of, so you can sleep good and not worrying about this or that. Just focusing on the game and not what people are saying.”

The first game will feature Razorback Zach Root 7-5, 3.78 ERA) (and Vol Marcus Phillips (4-4, 3.71 ERA) starting on the mound.

Tennessee ace Liam Doyle (10-3, 2.84, nation’s best 158 strikeouts in 92 innings) will start in the second game on Sunday.

Arkansas downed Tennessee 2 of 3 when the Vols visited Fayetteville back on May 15-17.

Van Horn notes that seeing a team so quickly again is different.

“It feels a little different because we just played in the last series of the regular season,” Van Horn said. “But it’s just a weekend. It comes down to one weekend. That’s the way we look at it. And we just got to take care of our business.”

Arkansas second baseman Cam Kozeal agrees that the Razorbacks, who have won 11 of the last 13 games against the Volunteers and 14 of the last 17, can’t get overhyped.

“I mean it is just another game, in that perspective,” Kozeal said. “It’s kind of what we have done all season.

“The times are kind of weird for us. I don’t know if we have really played at those time slots. You play at night or earlier in the day. It is going to be a fun weekend regardless.”

Arkansas lead off man Charles Davalan said he isn’t feeling the magnitude of the spotlight.

“Not really,” Davalan said. “ I feel like that’s been all of the SEC 0series, so it’s going to be fun. Good team. But nah, I think that’s the first time we’ve heard about, so it doesn’t really matter.”

Kozeal believes having faced Tennessee’s top two pitchers so quickly agains is a benefit.

“Yeah, I think so,” Kozeal said. “You can go back and look at your previous at-bats and just find the arm slots, see where they stand on the mound. All that good stuff. It’s just, you’ve done it before so it already brings a comfort level. Yeah. I mean, good arms. Power arms. It’s going to be a fun weekend.” 


Gaeckle, who teamed with Gage Wood to strike out 20 batters in a 8-3 win over Creighton in the Fayetteville Regional championship game last Sunday night, sized up the view from the mound.

“I mean, you’ve faced the lineup before and you can see what they got you on or what you got them on, so it definitely helps a little bit,” Gaeckle said.  

Wood (3-1, 5.33) will enter the series looked at as a starter, but the games will dictate his role per Van Horn.

“Whatever we need to do with him,” Van Horn said.  “As of now, he’s going to be a starter. But you just never know when you get to these series like this, how you’re going to do it.”

Arkansas pitching appears to be in much better shape this post season than it was the last two – something Van Horn noted was a goal.

“We’ve talked throughout the season, talked about it in the fall, that we’ve got to keep our guys obviously healthy, and not wear them out when it comes to the end of the season, because that’s the most important part.

“For the most part we’ve done a pretty good job with it. We have some depth in the bullpen so being able to spread it out. I (don’t) think we really over-pitched our pitchers on the weekends as far as pitch counts, especially early. We’d always tell them we’re saving that inning for later.”

Gaeckle agrees that Arkansas’ pitching is in great shape right now.

“Yeah, I’d say so,” Gaeckle said. “You know, you look at who we gained throughout the season. We just got Gage back and he’s getting ramped up, and then we got (reliever) Parker (Coil) back.

“I feel like we got stronger as the year went on, and we’re throwing the ball really well right now and hope we carry it into this you need in the postseason. You need everyone to come together and like each other and get along. So it’s been a fun adventure in that way.”

Photo by John D. James