Vanderbilt knocks off Razorbacks
FAYETTEVILLE - Vanderbilt Commodores home runs by Will Toffey and Julian Infante provided all Vandy starter Kyle Wright needed to beat Arkansas, 6-2 Saturday night before 8,021 at Baum Stadium.
Wright mowed down the Razorbacks throwing a 2-hit shutout for seven complete innings while striking out 11 against but one walk.
The Commodores evened their best of three SEC series with the Razorbacks going into today’s 1 p.m. rubber game at Baum.
The Razorbacks won Friday night’s game 4-3 on Luke Bonfield’s ninth-inning RBI single. Bonfield also hit a solo home run Friday night, and Dominic Fletcher hit a 2-run home run Friday night.
Saturday the Razorbacks fell to 36-14 overall and 15-10 in the SEC West following Toffey’s solo home run off losing starter Blaine Knight in the fifth inning and Infante’s 3-run seventh-inning home run over left off reliever Kacey Murphy after 1-out singles by Ro Coleman and Jeren Kendall.
Arkansas didn’t score Saturday night until its two in the ninth off freshman reliever Drake Fellows who had pitched a 1-2-3 eighth.
Jake Arledge singled and advanced on a wild pitch and infield out to score on Bonfield’s groundout before Grant Koch’s ninth-inning solo home run.
Vanderbilt comes 30-20 overall and 13-12 in the SEC East into today’s final regular-season game at Baum Stadium.
Thursday through Saturday the Razorbacks finish their regular SEC season at Texas A&M while Vanderbilt closes Thursday through Saturday hosting Alabama in Nashville.
Bryant native Knight, Saturday’s hard-luck loser, had been charged with three hits and two walks, but other than Vandy’s JJ Bledley robbed of a fourth-inning RBI single second baseman Carson Shaddy’s inning-ending great ranging catch and throw, hadn’t given up a hard-hit ball until hanging an 0-2 curve that Toffey pulled into the right field bullpen.
Knight did yield solid singles starting the Vandy sixth but was initially relieved out of the jam by third baseman Jared Gates snaring a potentially errant throw by reliever Cannon Chadwick for a bunt forceout at third.
Sophomore lefty Murphy finished the sixth with a strikeout and fly out and struck out Toffey to start the seventh before struck by the Coleman and Kendall singles, Infante’s 3-run blast followed by two Commodores walks before Arkansas Coach Dave Van Horn summoned right-handed senior Josh Alberius.
Alberius kept the Commodores scoreless until Jason Delay’s 2-run single in the ninth.
Jax Biggers, whose hustling a short bloop to left into a Friday night ninth-inning double set up Bonfield’s game-winner, broke up Wright’s Saturday no-hitter with a 1-out sixth-inning single to right. Biggers got to second on Jake Arledge’s grounder back to Wright before Chad Spanberger struck out.
After a lengthy seventh-inning umpires’ review whether Bonfield’s leadoff stroke into left was trapped or caught by left fielder Coleman, it was declared a single. Other than turning a 1-hitter into a 2-hitter, Wright made it a moot point striking out Koch and Gates and retiring Shaddy forcing out Bonfield.
Vandy freshman reliever Drake Fellows set Arkansas down in order in the eighth.