Will Doyle get the go?
The Tennessee Volunteers will open the NCAA Tournament this weekend at home, hosting the Knoxville Regional after landing the No. 14 national seed. Tony Vitello’s team limped home to close the regular season, but found a way to come away with two huge wins in Hoover to secure a top 16 seed.
And now the real fun begins — and so do the questions. Vitello now has to figure out what he’s going to do on the mound this weekend. 4th-seeded Miami-Ohio brings a legitimate ace to the mound that will challenge the Tennessee offense on Friday night. Do you match Cooper Katskee with Liam Doyle? Or save him in your back pocket for Saturday and roll with Marcus Phillips like last weekend?
For Vitello, he’s leaning towards the traditional route with Doyle on Friday.
“Yeah, more than likely,” Vitello said when asked if he’d stick with his plan. “We got some bullpens today, so we’ll see how those go and then have conversations. But that’s kind of been the order that held true through the season until we had schedule quirks there with the Thursday series and the tournament.
“So regardless of how we do it, we’re not looking to out-strategize anybody this time of year. Just out-compete people, or compete to the best of our abilities, and hopefully that gets us where we want, and if it doesn’t, maybe the fans give us an edge that pushes us over the top. Because that’s been the case a few times this time of year for us, when we’ve been fortunate enough to be in Knoxville.”
Doyle has given up ten earned runs in his last two starts, which have gone just 3.2 and 4.1 innings. The SEC pitcher of the year would be working on eight days of rest should he get the go on Friday. That extra rest could be big with Doyle dealing with a blister over the last couple of weeks.
“I think we feel good that we didn’t kind of put him through a meat grinder, especially after what he did (vs. Auburn and Vanderbilt),” Vitello said. “His hand is fine. Gave up more hits than he would have liked probably two weeks ago, or two outings ago, but he just faced the conference champs, and you know, it’s not like it was a terrible outing. It just wasn’t up to his standard. And also, we pulled him early because of what’s about to go on this weekend.”
Phillips is 3-4 on the year with a 3.67 ERA. And then you also have AJ Russell finally looking healthy again after throwing a long stint against Alabama. Pitching coach Frank Anderson certainly has options.
First pitch for Tennessee-Miami (OH) is set for Friday night at 6 p.m. ET. Wake Forest and Cincinnati will play before in the double-elimination format at 1 p.m. ET.