Walk-off drama in baseball's College World Series
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Ladies and gentlemen, Tommy White. Photo: Jay Biggerstaff/Getty Image
Tommy White has a penchant for hitting bombs — his nickname, after all, is Tommy Tanks — but his blast on Thursday night put all the rest to shame.
ICYMI: LSU's sophomore third baseman hit a walk-off, two-run homer in the bottom of the 11th against Wake Forest to break a scoreless tie and send the Tigers to the College World Series final.
- He went 2-4 with a walk and that majestic dinger, raising his triple slash to a ridiculous .370 batting average/.430 on-base percentage/.728 slugging percentage with 23 home runs and an even 100 RBI on the year, second-most in the nation.
- Not that this is too surprising: Last year at NC State — before transferring to LSU this season — he hit an NCAA freshman-record 27 homers with an 1.182 OPS.
Between the lines: It's hard to argue that a walk-off homer to send your team to the CWS final wasn't the best performance of the night. But the game only reached an 11th-inning stalemate thanks to a pitchers' duel for the ages between the two best arms in college baseball.
What happened: LSU's Paul Skenes and Wake's Rhett Lowder are projected to be the first two college pitchers off the board at next month's draft, and last night they showed why.
- Skenes, a finalist for this year's Golden Spikes Award (baseball's Heisman), threw 120 (!) near-flawless pitches in eight scoreless innings, with nine strikeouts, one walk and just two hits. On the year, he's 12-2 with a 1.69 earned run average and 209 strikeouts, by far the most in the nation.
- Lowder, the ACC pitcher of the year, went seven scoreless innings with six strikeouts, two walks and three hits. He went a perfect 15-0 this year and had a 1.88 ERA for the No. 1 team in the nation. Not bad.
Wild stat: This was the first CWS game in the aluminum bat era (since 1974) that both starters went at least seven innings and allowed three or fewer hits.
🎥 Must-watch play: LSU first baseman Tre' Morgan saved the game in the eighth when he fielded a bunt perfectly with a man on third and somehow got the runner at home.
The other side: Wake's storybook season is over, and thus a mind-boggling streak lives on: The No. 1 overall seed hasn't won the CWS since Miami in 1999, the first year the tournament expanded to 64 teams.
What's next: The CWS final — No. 2 Florida vs. No. 5 LSU — begins Saturday at 7pm ET.
