Texas' season concludes after epic super-regional battle with Stanford ends with a fly ball left uncaught

With two outs in the ninth inning of a 6-6 game, Lucas Gordon coaxed a fly ball from Stanford’s Drew Bowser. He pointed skyward and started walking toward the third base dugout, thinking he had recorded the third out of the frame and sent Game 3 of the Stanford super regional to extra innings. That initial point gave an indication of where the ball went, but neither centerfielder Eric Kennedy nor right fielder Dylan Campbell could identify the location of ball in the Palo Alto, Calif. sky.

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All the events prior to that fly ball were a part of one of the epic games of the entire 2023 college baseball season. Close plays, high-leverage at bats, and controversial calls littered the entire contest. Stanford and Texas, two historical powerhouses intending to reach the College World Series for the third consecutive year, battled on Monday night in a matchup between teams with imperfections each opponent poked and prodded. Stanford threw the first blow with three runs in the second. Texas responded with a three-spot in the third only for the Cardinal to take the lead right back in the bottom half of the frame.

Campbell, the heart and soul of the Longhorns all season, made season-defining plays with his bat and glove, driving in the tying run as part of a three-run eighth for Texas and recording his eighth outfield assist of the year with a 9-5 putout in the following half-inning.

Even the final frame had a moment. Alberto Rios, the Pac-12 player of the year, thought he had clinched the series with a walk-off solo shot, even throwing his helmet in celebration as he rounded first and scampered to second with what was only a double. The volume of moments built up, and the college baseball world fixed its eyes upon Sunken Diamond anticipating an exhilarating finish.

But the game, and Texas’ season, ended without an epic final crescendo or a mid-June trip to Nebraska. The fly ball fell between a quartet of Longhorns. None whom were in range or could pick it out of the early evening California sky. Rios scored from second, with Bowser gaining credit for the game-winning RBI in a 7-6 ballgame.

It was a gut-wrenching finish for a team that battled throughout various highs and lows all season. After a 4-7 start, the Longhorns surged to a 16-game winning streak and took control of first place in the Big 12. A sweep at the hands of Oklahoma functioned as another low point, but Texas battled once again to sweep West Virginia on the final weekend to clinch the third Big 12 regular season championship under head coach David Pierce. Along the way, Campbell paced the Longhorn offense with a Texas and Big 12 record 38-game hitting streak.

More adversity reared its head in Arlington at Globe Life Field, a place that has not been kind to Texas baseball in recent years, when the Longhorns went two-and-out in the Big 12 tournament as the No. 1 seed. Those loses likely cost Texas a chance to host postseason games at UFCU Disch-Falk Field, and sent UT on the road for a regional for the first time since 2017.

The tumultuous season found another high point when Texas surged through the Coral Gables regional, twice defeating the No. 9 national seed Miami Hurricanes. Then in the context of one series with Stanford, the entire season was encapsulated, only to be capped off with a brutal ending.

Texas won Game 1 in come from behind fashion, then succumbed to a 156-pitch complete game win by Cardinal ace Quinn Mathews. A pivotal game three followed, and it featured jaw dropping event after jaw dropping event.

Stanford plated three runs in the second via a Bowser two-run homer to center off UT starter Tanner Witt. Then, Sanborn Campbell singled and eventually scored on a wild pitch from Zane Morehouse, who let him dash home via a wild pitch.

Morehouse had fits of effectiveness, but was no doubt gutsy in his pitching. Even with a non-descript line of 6.0 innings with six hits, three earned runs, five walks, a wild pitch, and four strikeouts on 80 pitches, his highest total since a 90-pitch outing versus Cal State Fullerton on March 4, Morehouse did enough to keep Texas within striking distance during his outing.

Gordon replaced him days after throwing 110 pitches in Game 1 on Saturday. He quickly got through the eighth before the events of the ninth.

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Texas’ three-spot in the first was scored with two outs. Two singles and a walk off Stanford starter Nick Dugan brought up Jack O’Dowd, who pulled a first-pitch double to clear the bases.

UT’s sixth inning trio of runs were driven in by Mitchell Daly, Peyton Powell, and Campbell. Campbell worked an eight-pitch at bat, watching two pitches sail by for balls that could have been called strikes in other innings. On pitch eight, he returned the ball up the middle to score the tying run and make it 6-6.

Texas put a runner on in the ninth but could not move him around the bases before Stanford put on their own two-out rally that sent them to Omaha.

Texas now enters the offseason, one where the construction of the roster will be greatly affected by the transfer portal, the incoming class of 2023, and the MLB draft.

It enters that offseason much later than many experts and opponents would have expected after several inauspicious events were eventually countered by gritty performances which put the season back on pace for a tournament run. But it still ends at least one week earlier than the Longhorns would have liked in one of the most heartbreaking finishes in program history.