Jim Schlossnagle confident Texas is heading in right direction after first year leading program

Jim Schlossnagle’s first season as Texas head coach ended earlier than anticipated during the Austin Regional. The Longhorns, who earned a No. 2 overall seed in the NCAA Tournament, were stunned after splitting their four games as regional host.

The Longhorns finished the season with a 44-14 record with a 22-8 mark against SEC competition. Despite the disappointing end to his first year with the program, Schlossnagle was able to reflect on his first season at the helm of the Texas baseball program.

“I feel like that compared to where we started to where we are today, this program is in really good shape and headed in the right direction. I feel confident that our coaching staff, given the situation, got the most out of our team,” Schlossnagle said. “… Our coaching staff’s job is to put ourselves in position to get to Omaha. We did that, but we just didn’t execute in the games needed to win the regional.”

Texas’ regional effort started off without a hitch, dispatching Houston Christian 7-1 in their opening matchup on Friday. The Longhorns would fall 9-7 to UTSA in their first matchup of the weekend. Texas bounced back with a 15-8 win against Kansas State in the following matchup, but were met with stiff competition against the Roadrunners in the regional championship series.

The Longhorns found themselves trailing 7-0 early in the matchup. Despite Texas earning four runs back during the rest of the matchup, in the end, UTSA would advance to the Super Regional with a 7-4 win. It is the first-ever Super Regional berth for the Roadrunners.

While Texas entered the NCAA Tournament with College World Series aspirations, The postseason performance from Texas is not indicative of the success the Longhorns enjoyed during the regular season, according to Schlossnagle. Texas will now head into the offseason with a chip on its shoulder.

“I think we had a lot of things go our way (during) the first two thirds of the season. We’d get the two-out hit. We make the pitch. The ball gets hit at us. We won a lot of close games,” Schlossnagle continued. “Think about the A&M series. They had the tying and go-ahead run on base all three games to end the game.

“So we kind of lived in the margins, but that’s where college baseball is. I mean, that’s the difference between the teams that advance and the teams that don’t.”