Tony Vitello gives interesting take on trash-talking opponents

Upsets occur in college baseball but not many like Notre Dame over Tennessee on Sunday. After being the top team in the country all season, head coach Tony Vitello and his squad will see their season come up short of the ultimate goal — winning a national championship.

After the game, Vitello cleared up some confusion about an incident that occurred in the third inning while Tennessee was up to bat. He said the Volunteers were given a warning by the umpiring crew but went to discuss how both teams were expressing emotions throughout the entire game.

“That there was a warning for bench jockeying,” Vitello said. “I don’t know if it started with the play at third. I mean, you got their guy running around like a mad man, trying to stretch the whole thing. He got to second and he almost got to third. So I don’t know if it was from that collision. (Notre Dame pitcher Alex Rao) was throwing the ball well. Struck one of our guys out, told him to sit down. I mean, during the regular season, that’s what goes on. If you do something well and there’s a lot of emotion to it — which, probably if you do something well, it’s really important to you. So that’s the kind of stuff that comes out.”

Tony Vitello gives interesting take on trash-talking

Vitello went on to give an interesting take when it came to trash-talking within college baseball. He said in order to pull it off, teams have to earn the right. For Tennessee, when teams are talking, Vitello thinks it’s their job to respond in a positive way.

“When you do something like he did or other guys in that situation, you earn the right to say that kind of stuff. And it’s up to us to try and respond back and see if we can get to the guy. That’s just kind of my philosophy on some of that stuff. I’m disappointed in myself but it was nice that the game was decided on the field. For many reasons, they were the better team today.”

Tennessee was known all season for enjoying the game themselves, even if opponents were not huge fans of their antics. At the same time, Vitello knows if the Volunteers can dish it, they should be able to take it when the time calls as well.

A subtle shot may have been taken there at the umpires when it comes to ejection from previous games but at the end of the day, Vitello knows Notre Dame was the better team on Monday. Even if some extra trash talk came with the loss.