Vanderbilt third baseman Jayson Gonzalez homered and added a walk-off single, as the Commodores came from behind to beat Arizona, 7-6, in a 12-inning game in the College World Series opener for each team at TD Ameritrade Park in Omaha, Neb., on Saturday night.
Gonzalez hit a pitch from Vince Vannelle through short, scoring Isaiah Thomas with the winning run for the Commodores, who played from behind much of the night .
"It’s just a dream come true to be here, to be in this situation," said Gonzalez, who didn't play last year, was in and out of the starting lineup this year and lost his starting job early in 2019, when he didn't see action in Vandy's last College World Series trip.
Gonzalez had a game-high three hits and also smashed a two-run homer in the fourth off Arizona starter Chase Silseth to tie the game at three.
In the seventh, Carter Young gave Vanderbilt its first lead of the evening with a two-run homer off Preston Price.
Vanderbilt didn't get a great start from Kumar Rocker (5 2/3 innings, five runs, three earned, seven strikeouts) but the bullpen picked the Commodores up. Nick Maldonado, Luke Murphy and Chris McElvain for 6 1/3 innings of one-run ball, 12 strikeouts and just five runners allowed.
McElvain (5-1) got the win after pitching out of a 12th-inning jam.
"Just a tough ballgame. … I guess both sides felt like that thing would never end but it did," Corbin said of a game that lasted 4:51 and featured 414 pitches.
The Commodores will face North Carolina State on Monday evening in a winner's bracket game. Jack Leiter will start that one for Vanderbilt (46-15).
Thomas led off the 12th when he reached on a hard-hit ball off Vannelle's pitching hand. Parker Noland laid a terrific bunt down first and reached safely. C.J. Rodriguez missed an opportunity to win it when he hit a foul pop-up to third.
Things didn't look great when Gonzalez fell down 1-2 in the count, and the ball he subsequently hit wasn't exactly belted. But with the infield in, the ball squirted through and the Commodores celebrated a win.
"My whole thought process was just to get a ball over the plate, put a ball in play and hopefully something good would happen and thankfully something good happened with that pitch," Gonzalez said.
The game-winner was hit in an area where a shortstop often starts a double play, but instead, it got by a diving Nic McClaughry.
"That ball just found an area of the field that wasn’t covered," Corbin said.
Had that ball found a glove, it would have been another layer of frustration for an offense that had the bases loaded in the 11th with one out and failed to deliver.
The Commodores also got the leadoff man on in the ninth and failed to score.
Arizona left the night with a similar frustration. Donta Williams led off the top of the 12th by crashing a double off the wall in center on McElvain's second pitch of the evening.
That put Vanderbilt in a precarious position, with the No. 2, 3 and 4 hitters of the nation's top run-scoring offense up next. But McElvain got Jacob Berry to fly to left before fanning Branden Boissiere and Tony Bullard on 93-mile-an-hour fastballs.
"I thought he contained himself so well and pitched so well," Corbin said. "To me that’a a Murderer's Row right there. … That lineup particularly the top four or five or six, they’re just good. I thought [McElvain] just beared down when he did. … just being able to hold it together, that’s a tough moment for that kid."
Earlier in the evening, Vandy would have just settled to get to that point. Arizona sent eight men to the plate against Rocker in a 36-pitch first inning. First baseman Dominic Keegan's error started the game, then, Berry and Boisierre slammed doubles to put Arizona up 2-0 in the blink of an eye. A two-out Daniel Susac single added another run.
Troy LaNeve added a two-out double in the bottom of the inning, but the score remained 3-1 until Gonzalez mashed a homer about three rows deep to right-center off Silseth.
By that time, Rocker was in a groove until it came to a screeching halt in the sixth. He'd retired 15 hitters in a row before plunking Kobe Kato in the knee with a 2-2 pitch in the sixth.
Two pitches later, Ryan Holgate hit the hardest ball of the night on a 1-1 fastball that caught the middle of the plate and sailed well out to right.
But back came Vandy in the seventh, when Gonzalez took a one-out walk on a 3-2 pitch from Silseth that looked like strike three. A wild pitch and an Enrique Bradfield Jr. single later, the Wildcat lead was 5-4 before Young's bomb flipped the script.
In the ninth, Susac led off with a double off a tiring Maldonado and came around on a Williams sacrifice fly with one out to tie the game with Murphy now on. Murphy struck out Berry to end it and then start a run of five consecutive strikeouts.
Murphy left after 47 pitches and turned it over to McElvain, who needed 13 to get through the 12th.
Vanderbilt out-hit Arizona, 14-9, but left 10 on to the Wildcats" seven. LaNeve, Rodriguez and Keegan each chipped in with two.
