Bloody Day for UGA, but Dawgs Advance
ATHENS - It was a bloody afternoon for Georgia, but it got out alive in more ways than one.
No. 8 Georgia came back from a mid-game deficit to rally past Troy to win 11-7. Georgia had trialed the Trojans 6-3 going into the 6th inning. The win puts Georgia into the championship series of the Regional, and one win away from hosting a Super Regional next weekend.
See Dawg Post's photos of the Action here...
Georgia’s Aaron Schunk left the game in the 5th inning after breaking his nose trying to catch a foul ball and diving head first into the Troy dugout.
"As far as broken noses are concerned he has a good one,” Scott Strickland said.” He cracked it. It was sideways when I saw it. They put it back in place.”
Strickland said following the game that Schunk was “day-to-day” and that he would use a mask if he played Monday.
The game changed soon after that moment when Zac Kristofak emerged from Georgia’s bullpen to give Georgia’s heavy bats time to get going. Down 5-3 to the upstart Trojans and with one of its best players out of the game with a broken, bloody nose, Kristofak slowed Troy’s scoring for long enough for the Dawgs to wake up.
He allowed only two runs.
“Zac shut it down,” Scott Strickland said after the win.
With all bleeding (on field and on player) slowed, UGA’s bats took advantage of the hot Georgia summer - scoring eight runs in the 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th innings.
We’ve seen this sort of thing before. The NCAA Baseball Tournament isn’t exclusively for front runners. This is quite clearly a team game. Its rare a pitching staff, exclusively, can win you a Regional, Super Regional and the CWS. Its rare that a hitting lineup can do it, either.
Teams have to have everything - guys coming off the bench to sub for starters knocked out of the game with a nasty bloody accident; middle inning pitching; and the standard hitting and pitching.
That’s what this is. You will be challenged. This won’t come easy.
That’s why Kristofak’s performance today, three innings, three hits allowed and two runs given up, was so critical. Troy was hitting Georgia’s starting pitching. Saturday Campbell hit Georgia’s starting pitching. Georgia’s starting pitching will likely settle down here soon, but players have to come in and get the job done.
That happened today and it gave Kristofak a post-season win.
Ryan Webb slammed the door on the Trojans from there by allowing only one hit over 2.1 innings. That Keegan McGovern and Michael Curry combined to have six hits and drive in eight runs shouldn’t be overlooked. Actually, it was impossible to overlook McGovern’s homer to center of Georgia’s massive green wall.
“I think mine went just a tad bit farther,” McGovern said of the back-to-back home runs he had twice Sunday with Michael Curry. “It was really awesome. I will have to go back and watch it.”
“Its hard to call pitches when those two are in the lineup,” Strickland said after the win.
That’s true.
Now Georgia waits for Monday, and a chance to get to a Super Regional for the first time since Gordan Beckham and crew slammed their way to Omaha.
But today was about Zac Kristofak. His performance, coming to the mound in the middle of the game, saved the Dawgs.
“When we put Zac in there that early we have to win. Bottom line - we have to win that game anyway we can,” Strickland said.
That happened today - any way Georgia could.