Fresno State to face Georgia for title
OMAHA, Neb. – Fresno State Bulldogs fans have been wearing their “Underdog to Wonderdog” T-shirts around Rosenblatt Stadium for days en masse.
They just might get a chance to order some national championship shirts pretty soon.
Fresno State’s improbable postseason run will end in the College World Series championship round after Tommy Mendonca drove in four runs and Clayton Allison overcame a shoulder ailment to shut down North Carolina in a 6-1 victory Sunday night.
“If you look where we started out,” closer Brandon Burke said, “where we’re at now is inconceivable.”
A Fresno State team (45-30) that became the first No. 4 regional seed to reach the CWS now finds itself matched against Georgia (44-23-1) in the best-of-three championship series starting today.
North Carolina (54-14), the No. 2 national seed and CWS runner-up the past two years, was denied a third straight appearance in the finals.
“Fresno, they’ve got to put the underdog card down,” Georgia coach David Perno said. “It isn’t going to fly with us. They’re a real good baseball team.”
Fresno State coach Mike Batesole has used underdog talk to motivate his players throughout the postseason, and he doesn’t plan to stop now.
“You look at the two clubs on paper,” Batesole said, “and you’d have to think that.”
Georgia is the first team to bounce back from a losing season to reach the CWS finals the following year.
Neither has an overly impressive record, and no team with more than 23 losses has ever won a national title. That could change this year.
Fresno State’s journey has been anything but smooth.
The Bulldogs have made it through the postseason without ace Tanner Scheppers, a second-round pick by Pittsburgh who is out with a slight rotator cuff tear.
In the regionals, Fresno State came off a 15-1 thumping by San Diego to beat the host Toreros 5-1 the next day for the title. In the super regionals, the Bulldogs lost the first game 12-4 to Arizona State, then won two straight against the No. 3 national seed to advance to Omaha.
Fresno State hammered Rice 17-5 in its CWS opener and beat North Carolina 5-3 in its second game. The Tar Heels came from behind Saturday to win 4-3 on Chad Flack’s eighth-inning home run.
Still, the Bulldogs’ resolve was anything but broken. They were in control all night Sunday, pressuring the Tar Heels every inning and scoring at least a run in each between the third and sixth.
Carolina’s loss means the Atlantic Coast Conference will go another year without a national title in baseball. The Tar Heels and fellow ACC members Miami and Florida State all reached the CWS, but Wake Forest remains the only team from the conference with a baseball title, winning it in 1955.