Notre Dame holds down Texas offense, wins opener
OMAHA, NEB. >> John Michael Bertrand and two relievers held Texas' potent offense in check and Notre Dame scored in all kinds of ways in a 7-3 victory Friday night in its first College World Series game in 20 years.
The Irish (41-15) carried over their momentum from eliminating No. 1 national seed Tennessee in the super regionals with a strong all-around performance against the program making its record 38th appearance in Omaha.
Notre Dame will play Oklahoma on Sunday. The Longhorns (47-21) will face rival Texas A&M in an elimination game.
Bertrand (10-3), roughed up in his start against Tennessee last week, limited the Longhorns to three runs on six hits in 5 1/3 innings. Alex Rao and Jack Findlay gave up no hits in 3 1/3 innings, with Findlay earning his fourth save.
The Irish scored six runs on nine hits against Texas starter Pete Hansen (11-3). They picked up single runs on Jared Miller's home run in the first inning, an RBI groundout in the third and a safety squeeze in the fourth, and they scored three more in the fifth on Tristan Stevens' balk and a couple singles.
Carter Putz's homer in the ninth gave the Irish a four-run lead.
The Longhorns arrived in Omaha with a programrecord 128 homers, most among the CWS teams and fourth nationally, and had hit three or more in each of its previous four games.
They mustered only six singles against the Irish and were the only team in the first two CWS games to not hit a homer.
Douglas Hodo II had an RBI single, and the Longhorns scored on a squeeze play and wild pitch. OKLAHOMA 13, TEXAS A&M 8>> Jackson Nicklaus hit a grand slam, Jake Bennett pitched six strong innings and Oklahoma jumped on No. 5 national seed Texas A&M early in a win in the College World Series opener.
The Sooners scored seven runs with two outs in the second inning to lead 8-0 and then turned back the Aggies' comeback bids in the highest-scoring CWS game since 2008.
“We talked about being a team of Davids and attacking the giant,” Nicklaus said. “That's been our team motto lately. We just want to attack the game and play with no fear. We had a game plan. We wanted to execute early. We did.”
The Sooners (43-22), who advanced to Omaha as a No. 2 regional seed, will play Sunday against the winner of the Notre Dame-Texas game Friday night. Texas A&M (42-19) will play the loser of that game.
Oklahoma won a week after the school's softball team earned its second straight Women's College World Series championship.
Texas A&M has lost nine straight CWS games over five appearances since it beat Kansas in 1993.