Sports Page Atlanta

Georgia came back down 3 in the 8th inning to pull ahead of Fresno State to win game one last night by the score of 7 to 6 and they can win it all with a win tonight.

Joey Lewis came through again in Omaha by getting a rbi single to score Matt Cerione with the go-ahead run.  Cerione who went 0-for-5 with 5 strikeouts in his last game, shook it off by twice getting game-tying hits.

Gordon Beckham was the other big offensive star by clubbing his 27th home run of the season which was also his 52nd of his career (a new Georgia record).

Trevor Holder for the most part pitched well (except for a few long balls).  Alex McRee struggled for the first time in a long time and Justin Earls allowed a hit to the only batter he faced.  Will Harvill did the job and closed the 8th and then Joshua Fields came through and retired the side in the 9th to save his 18th game of the season.

The Fresno State Bulldogs threw 5 pithers last night.  Justin Miller who I thought was going to pitch yesterday did not and will most likely pitch tonight (but then again I could be wrong).

Nick Montgomery will take the mound for Georgia and this would be a nice way for him to end his career with the Bulldogs.

After trailing for the majority of the game, the Dawgs came back and defeated Stanford 4-3. Senior Nick Montgomery struggled in the 3rd inning and allowed all 3 runs score, 2 courtesy of Jason Castro’s 2-run homer (this guy is a stud… offensively and defensively… Houston got a good player in the draft… it might be tought, but remember… Castro the Astro).

Anyway… Stephen Dodson came in to pitch and was lights out and so watch Alex McRee, both were big-time nasty at times.

Georgia fought back with one in the 4th and one in the 6th. Then in the 7th with 2 outs and no one on, All-American Gordon Beckham ignited a rally with a single to left, Rich Poythress walked and then Bryce Massanari appeared to hit a 3-run homer, but it was just foul… he was later hit-by-the-pitch and with the bases loaded, Matt Cerione singled to center and the tying and go ahead runs scored. Dawgs up 4-3.

In the 9th, Joshua Fields came into the game for his first save opportunity since May 13th. After getting the first batter out, he then hit the next batter, then walked the one after that. With the tying run just 180 feet away, he got pinch-hitter Colin Walsh to hit into the 6-4-3 double play to end the game.

Georgia will now face the Stanford/Miami winner on Friday. If the Bulldogs win that one they will advance to the College World Series Championship series. If they lose they will play that same team again on Saturday.

As mentioned below, the Georgia Bulldogs won the Athens Regional by defeating Georgia Tech in the final game by the score of 18-6.  After losing the first game in the regional to Lipscomb, the Dawgs won 4 straight and now will face NC State at home starting on Friday.  Georgia is now 15-0 in elimination games at Foley Field in NCAA Tournament action.

It was the offense that exploded that helped Georgia succeed.  Collectively the Dawgs batted .398 and averaged over 11 runs during the 5 games.  Of the 82 total hits they got, 8 were hit for home runs.  

But check out how these averages improved from the beginning of the region to the end.  Remember it is hard to increase averages by a lot after playing 57 games, so some of these are quite impressive…

                                           Started at                Finished                  Increased

Matt Olson                         .294                          .333                           .039

Matt Cerione                     .273                          .295                            .022

Bryce Massanari               .330                          .346                            .016

Role players such as Miles Starr and David Thoms contributed as well…

Miles Starr entering the region: 2-fo-18 in the region went 2-for-7

David Thoms entering the region: 6-for-32 in the region went 3-for-12