No. 4 seed Diamond Heels fall, 6-1, to No. 1 seed Tennessee in College World Series

OMAHA, Neb. — The No. 4 UNC baseball team (48-15), who has made a living on late-game heroics, couldn’t overcome an early four-run hole against No. 1 Tennessee (57-12) on Sunday, falling 6-1 in the winner’s bracket game. 

The Tar Heels started slow against Volunteer starter Drew Beam, going down in order to begin the first. UNC responded in the bottom of the frame with a 1-2-3 inning of its own. 

Senior shortstop Colby Wilkerson stole a base hit from junior second baseman Christian Moore, who hit for just the second cycle in CWS history in Tennessee’s first game, diving to his right and firing from his knees in time to beat Moore to the bag. 

“Colby's been really good there all year,” junior center fielder Vance Honeycutt said. “Christian Moore smoked that ball and Colby made a great play, and [we’re] just continuing to make great plays behind our pitchers.”

Graduate right fielder Anthony Donofrio had a base hit of his own robbed in the second. He drove an 0-2 pitch to dead center, and Volunteer center fielder Hunter Ensley reached over his head to snag the ball while crashing into the fence with his left shoulder. From there, UNC went down in order again.

The Volunteers couldn’t capitalize on a leadoff walk from junior left-handed pitcher Shea Sprague in their half of the second. A slow roller moved the runner over to second, but he was stranded there after a two-out flyout to Donofrio in right.

The surprising pitcher’s duel between two of the best offenses in the country continued in the third as both teams went three up, three down. Neither team produced a hit through the first three innings of the game.

Senior first baseman Parks Harber collected the first hit of the evening with two outs in the fourth, punching a single over the second baseman’s head and into right field. The next batter, Donofrio, stranded him on first with a swinging strikeout on a 3-2 heater.

“First time through the order, he attacked us with fastballs and then second time around he did a good job landing those offspeed pitches to get ahead in the count and keep you off balance,” Harber said. “So it's kind of a credit to him and his preparation tonight.”

Tennessee responded with its first hit off Sprague to leadoff the bottom of the inning. The Volunteers worked runners on first and second, and redshirt sophomore right fielder Kavares Tears began the scoring with a two-out, 390-foot bomb into the right-field bullpen. The three-run shot came off an 80 mph offspeed pitch from Sprague. 

Beam pitched himself into trouble in the fifth, offering consecutive free passes to first-year third baseman Gavin Gallaher and senior designated hitter Jackson Van De Brake. With two runners on and just one out, the Tar Heels couldn’t chip away at the lead after graduate second baseman Alex Madera and Wilkerson both struck out.

Sprague returned to the mound to start the fifth, but a leadoff solo shot from Volunteer designated hitter Reese Chapman forced head coach Scott Forbes to make a call to the bullpen. 

Sophomore pitcher Matthew Matthijs’ entrance to the game was stalled by a 16-minute delay in which the home plate umpire was replaced due to a concussion from an earlier incident. The Volunteers couldn’t add to the lead in the inning, as Matthijs stranded a runner on second.

UNC began its comeback effort in the sixth as junior center fielder Vance Honeycutt launched a no-doubter into the bleachers in left-center field for a solo home run. The next two hitters singled to keep the bats rolling. A base running error by Donofrio killed the Tar Heels’ rally, though, and a swinging strike out by Gallaher left redshirt sophomore Casey Cook stranded on third. 

“Donofrio has done such a good job for us this year and that situation didn't work out, but I have all the confidence in the world that on Tuesday against Florida State that we'll be in a similar position and he'll come through,” Harber said.

Tennessee capitalized on the mistake in the bottom of the inning, adding a run on a two-out RBI single up the middle to extend the lead back to four. 

The Volunteers put the game away in the eighth with an RBI double down the right-field line to drive in the team’s sixth run of the game. UNC went down unceremoniously in the final frame as sophomore pitcher Nate Snead secured the win for Tennessee by inducing a line out from Van De Brake.

“I really thought we pitched it well enough to win the game and even pitched it better than six runs,” Forbes said. “They just capitalized and got that big hit — didn’t leave many guys on base.”

UNC will play with its season on the line against No. 8 Florida State on Tuesday at 1 p.m. CST. 

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