Notre Dame Baseball Bashes UConn, Advances To Regional Final
SOUTH BEND – A Saturday evening meeting against UConn posed Notre Dame with its most difficult test of the South Bend regional.
The No. 2 regional seed Huskies were starting ace Ben Casparius, who is considered a top-200 prospect in this year’s MLB draft and has a .194 opponent batting average. The Big East champions entered the NCAA tournament hitting .294 as a team and were 11-1 in their last 12 games.
Notre Dame (32-11) brushed away the threat like a broom taking on dust in advancing to Sunday’s regional final, where it will meet the winner of tomorrow afternoon’s UConn and Central Michigan game. A win Sunday sends Notre Dame to the super regional.
A 26-3 dump-trucking of UConn not to be confused with a football score was newspaper-to-fly lopsided and fodder for broken records. The Irish hung five runs in the first inning and scored in seven of nine frames. (In a postseason oddity, they were the away team in their home stadium). They led 12-2 after four innings. They scored 20 runs in a game for the first time since 2008.
“The focus, ability to manage the at-bat and lay off some tough pitches is really what got it going,” head coach Link Jarrett said.
First baseman Niko Kavadas, once again, was at the center of the outburst. He started the onslaught with a first-inning grand slam that spotted Notre Dame a 5-0 lead before UConn (34-18) came to bat.
It was all Notre Dame would need, but the faucet flowed for more than three-and-a-half hours on this night. The 26 runs are the most in team history in an NCAA Tournament game. The Irish reached base safely 31 times, and each starter did so at least twice. They landed haymaker after haymaker, with no sign of mercy.
The first four hitters of the game reached base, with designated hitter Carter Putz’s single opening the scoring. Two batters later, Kavadas launched a 2-2 pitch to left-center field for a grand slam.
“He hung in there and crushed that,” Jarrett said. “That blow, when you look back you could say it won the game, but it changed how the early part of that game was played on our end.”
Notre Dame drew the curtains on this obliteration with an eight-run ninth inning, highlighted by three-run homers from Kavadas and left fielder Ryan Cole. In two tournament games, Kavadas is 5 for 8 with four home runs, 12 RBI and two walks. He has hit in the No. 6 spot in both games and will stay there Sunday, Jarrett said. His eight RBI on Saturday are a single-game school record. All four of his home runs have come on two-strike counts.
“He has contained the at-bat and managed the at-bat really well, just through aggression on balls that are in the lane he’s looking for and patience on things that are up, down or off the plate,” Jarrett said.
Notre Dame tagged Casparius with 12 baserunners and 11 earned runs in three and two-thirds innings pitched before he left due to injury. His counterpart, Will Mercer, tossed seven innings and allowed two runs. He worked around eight hits and did not walk a batter. The hearty cushion allowed him to pitch to contact without a slim margin for error.
“There were balls that found their way through, but when he’s on the ground with it, he has been effective,” Jarrett said. “Sometimes, when he’s up and the ball is in the air, he’s not as good. But today, ground balls, defense played well.
“He was good, maybe as good as I’ve seen him. He was in total control of what he was doing.”
Thanks to deep outings from Mercer and Friday starter John Michael Bertrand, Notre Dame heads into Sunday with its bullpen having thrown just two innings. Its opponent, meanwhile, will be playing a fourth game in less than 72 hours and, presumably, will have rather taxed pitching staff.
"We're in the driver's seat," Jarrett said. "That's what happens when you set it up and you win."
A Notre Dame loss would still bring up another chance to clinch the regional Monday, but after two wins by a combined score of 36-3, the Irish are entirely disinterested in entertaining any such scenario.
“We’re all feeling good and playing our best games,” Cole said. “We’re not really thinking about playing on Monday.”
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