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Ryan McGee, ESPN Senior Writer
OMAHA, Neb. — The 2023 Men’s College World Series continues to make history during Sunday’s Game 2 matchup between LSU and Florida. It wasn’t just the kind of history we’ve come to expect from this wildest MCWS. After a walk-off thriller in a championship opener, an LSU homer in the top of the 11th to produce the record-tying eighth one-run game in this 15-game series, the 15th and most recent of those games achieved the whole. bucket of records all to himself.
The difference is that this is the first 2023 statistical milestone directly related to a butt-kicking. Like, historically perverted butt-kicking. Think Georgia vs. TCU, Dream Team vs. Angola, Hulk vs. Loki. That’s kind of butt-kicking.
Florida’s 24-4 victory that set up a Monday night winner-take-all title game (7 p.m. ET on ESPN) also set a record for the largest margin of victory ever posted in the Men’s College World Series finals contest. That score is a dozen runs. Now it’s 20, tied for the second-largest margin of any MCWS game played. It could have been even bigger if the Gators hadn’t gone within two after their third touchdown (insert rimshot here). In the 76 years of the MCWS, no team has scored more runs in a game than the 2023 SEC regular-season co-champions, even during the so-called “Gorilla Ball” era of unregulated aluminum bats in the 1990s.
“The bad news is we can’t carry any momentum from now until tomorrow night’s game,” Florida coach Kevin O’Sullivan said. “The good news is you’ve been struggling and you’ve been grinding and you’ve had four games and they’re all one game, three wins and one tough loss, and now you’re being reminded, ‘Hey, guys, know- we know how to play. We can play our kind of game.’ Our best players did well today.”
Florida’s bats have been criticized for being largely absent since the team arrived at Nebraska, especially after hitting a paltry .158 in Game 1, going 0-for-10 with runners in scoring position. Heading into the championship series, the would-be Murderers’ Row of Cade Kurland, Wyatt Langford and Jac Caglianone had five hits between them. By Sunday afternoon, however, they had 10 hits. Langford alone had five, setting the mark for most hits in a game in the finals, tying the record for any MCWS game.
So, how do you handle that if you’re LSU? This is a storied program playing for its seventh national title. A proud team ranked No. 1 in the nation for the largest chunk of the regular season. But this is also a team that surrendered the most runs it has given up in an NCAA tourney game, 24 of them, and also committed a finals record-setting five errors.
What does the American soccer coach always say on that popular TV streaming series? Become a goldfish.
“I feel like everybody in the locker room has already forgotten about it, really,” said centerfielder Dylan Crews, who had two hits and scored half of LSU’s four runs. With that locker room cleared and the team bus loaded in record time, head coach Jay Johnson opted to speed up the postgame routine to get back to the hotel and squeeze in a “rest day” before the first pitch. on Monday night, almost a full 24 hours away. “We’ve only lost two back-to-back games this year. So, we flush it out, we start preparing and we show up again tomorrow like we always do.”
You can also teach history. Recent history, like the fact that the Colorado Rockies did this week against the Angels.
Finding the MCWS silver linings takes a little digging, but there is hope. That finals game errors record? The last team to have such a bad day on the field was Fresno State in 2008, when it kicked the ball about four times … and won a national title. Since the title series went three games in 2003, 12 of the 19 champs have done it to LSU, winning Game 1. And anyone wearing purple and gold and yelling “Geaux Tigers!” It didn’t take much of an excuse to bring up 1996, when second baseman Warren Morris, who had missed almost the entire season with a broken hand, stepped to the plate and completed LSU’s comeback from a four-run deficit. while he barely threw a homer. over the right wall to win the MCWS in what is still considered the greatest moment in the history of this event.
On Sunday morning, as if they were going to college baseball church, LSU fans lined up to take pictures with the rightfield foul pole from the demolished Rosenblatt Stadium, which still stands in what is now the zoo’s parking lot.
“There’s a lot of stories in the College World Series of guys struggling, struggling, struggling, and then taking a big hit and making a big play for it,” Johnson said, referring to the shortstop who Jordan Thompson, who went 0-for-4 Sunday, is 1-for-30 in the series and has committed two of five errors. But in reality, the coach talked to his whole team. And yes, maybe Warren Morris, too.
On the other hand, how did Florida handle the opposite result? As the Gators players repeated once, twice, eleven times in their postgame comments, they … everything now!
“It’s one game, so we’ll treat it like one game like always do,” said right fielder Ty Evans, who hit two foul pole-bending homers, giving the sophomore a MCWS record-equaling four. although only four during the game. 65 games were played before reaching Omaha.
“Yes, it’s a game, so we’re going to change it to a game,” Caglianone reiterated.
“Yeah, we’re going to take it one game at a time and now that’s one game at a time,” Langford said.
The coach who preached that mentality to them all season was a little more nuanced. O’Sullivan was asked about the visible roller coaster of emotions a nation saw on ESPN as the record-smashing Game 2 went into the books and the specter of Game 3 loomed over the horizon. A big smile followed a moment of solemn solitude in a corner of the dugout.
“It’s really hard to unwind, to be honest,” explained the man who is aiming for his second MCWS title. “You lose a game like last night [Game 1] and to be honest, it’s really hard to leave it. But you must. That was the message last night. And then, now, just to flip the switch and the whole story and that whole changes. It’s just … it’s emotional to accept it.”
Then he remembered finally coming out of the dugout to greet the throngs of Florida fans in the stands, singing, as usual, Tom Petty’s Gainesville hit “I Won’t Back down.”
“We’re all fans, you know. You sang the song at the end. Really, really cool. Amazing deal.”
That was it. It is. And it will happen, one way or another, again on Monday night with a championship on the line.
