As the Dawgs entered the bottom of the ninth of their third game in the NCAA Regional tournament, they looked dead in the water. They were trailing the UNC Tar Heels by four runs, a lead the Heels had acquired after three innings and never looked back from. This was an elimination game for both teams, as they had each lost one game already in the tournament, ironically to the VCU Rams.
It had been a slow game for the UGA offense, as the Dawgs only managed to get two batters across the plate until the ninth inning after an RBI-single in the third, and an RBI-double in the sixth. Other than those two, the Dawgs just could not find a way to score, as they left 12 runners stranded over the course of the game.
The bats started to explode in the ninth however, as senior Connor Tate led the inning off with a line drive single. That was immediately followed up with a groundrule double from his twin Cole Tate, and after the next batter grounded out to the third baseman, senior Chaney Rogers blasted a ball over the fence to suddenly make it a one-run ballgame. Fans thought senior Josh McAllister had tied it with a deep shot to center field, but Vance Honeycutt made a fantastic leap off the wall to reach up and catch it before it landed on the other side of the fence.
Down to their final out, the Tar Heels sent in lefty pitcher Caden O’Brien to deal with the Dawgs’ left-handed pinch-hitter Corey Collins, and O’Brien managed to catch Collins flat-footed and blow a called strike three past him to end the Dawgs’ 2022 campaign.
“It’s a cruel game. It’s a game of inches,” said head coach Scott Stricklin after the game. “We didn’t stop fighting. I’m really proud of this team, because that’s the kind of team we’ve been all year long. We kept fighting no matter what adversity we faced.”
With the heartbreaking loss, the Dawgs finish the season with a 36-23 overall record and a 15-15 conference record and will be hoping some new players will step up in big ways next season, as heavy hitters like Cole Tate, Connor Tate, and Chaney Rogers all graduate from the program.