Diamond Hogs drop first SEC series
Harold McIlvain II
Issue date: 4/13/09 Section: Sports
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But the constant rain around the Fayetteville area said otherwise.
During the two-game series sweep by Vanderbilt, the No. 12 Arkansas Razorbacks struck out 25 times at the plate and committed eight errors.
"It's a long season," Van Horn said. "We've played a lot of five-game weeks. I just credit Vanderbilt. Baseball can be cruel. If you don't play well and make some mistakes, you can explode a little bit. And they took advantage of everything we did wrong."
Vanderbilt used one of the four errors Arkansas committed and a home run Saturday to score first in the third inning during the 13-6 win.
"They didn't give us a thing early," Van Horn said. "They had their opportunities and took advantage of them. Things just kind of snowballed."
But for the second consecutive day, a big inning knocked Arkansas out of the contest.
"They did a incredible job of putting a nine-run inning together," Van Horn said. "Those are few and far between. Everything they did worked. They had a hit-and-run that found a hole. It was just a super inning."
Arkansas used three different pitchers during the inning that had five hits, four walks and two errors.
"It was pretty devastating for us," Van Horn said. "With the wind blowing in and the way they were pitching, we felt like we were in big trouble. We just didn't get it done on our side."
Vanderbilt head coach Tim Corbin said it was important to break out with a big inning.
"We came out strong and put together a couple of big innings," Corbin said. "We did some things in certain situations which we have to do against a good club like Arkansas."
After being shutout for the first 14 innings of the series, Arkansas broke through with a four-run sixth inning against Vanderbilt starter Caleb Cotham, who finished the game with 12 strikeouts.
Home runs from sophomore Brett Eibner, senior Ryan Cisterna and sophomore Andy Wilkins helped propel the inning.
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