Our baseball team is picking it up as third baseman Brodie Johnston and right fielder Braden Holcomb, among many others, are pounding the baseball right now. And, just as importantly, we are pitching MUCH better, which we had to have. The defense has been stellar lately.
I’ll have some more on Friday with details on Brodie, Braden, Mancini, Ryker Waite, Ruston Rigdon, etc, and what to look for as No.4 Texas (D1 Baseball Rankings) comes to Nashville for a three game set at the Hawk. Couldn’t be more gigantic of a series.
Our RPI, as reported by Warren Nolan, an expert in the field, is 69, which is probably not good enough yet to get us in the NCAA Tournament. But we’ve improved markedly in the last week after taking 2 of 3 from Kentucky in Lexington and defeating Xavier, 11-1, in 8 innings by the run rule, a 10 or more run lead after the trailing team has hit in the 7th. We are now 25-17 overall and 9-9 in the always rugged SEC. We started out slowly in the non-conference and the SEC has been as brutal as ever. But we’ve held our own. But we’ve got work to do.
Connor Fennell has been pitching well on Friday Nights, and our bullpen was better last weekend in Lexington. We just need to get better starting pitching on Saturday and Sunday, and our bullpen needs to keep progressing.
Brodie’s been awesome hitting .367 with 13 homers and 38 steaks. Braden is also hitting well at .329 with 12 and 39. Waite, our shortstop, is hitting .301 with 5 and 32 and is 9 for 12 in base stealing, and our great senior, second baseman Mike Mancini, is hitting .301 with 12 and 39. Mancini is also 12-for-12 in stolen bases. We always need to manufacture runs. It can be the difference between winning and losing, and we’ve been pretty strong lately in the stealing and bunt games along with our hitting prowess.
Braden was 4 for 5 Tuesday versus Xavier, and our superb sophomore first baseman, Tommy Goodin, who has taken over at first, was three for 5 with a three run shot and 5 Ribeyes. Waite hit a grand salami. Tommy is hitting .295 with 9 long ones and 29 Ribbies.
Game one Friday versus Texas is at 6 P.M. CT/7 ET on SEC Network+. Saturday’s game is at 7 P.M. CT/8 ET on the SEC Network. And Sunday’s finale is at 12 P.M.CT/1 East on ESPN2.
Major weekend ahead at the Hawk, and we’ll have to pitch well because Texas hits .303 as a team and has a 3.41 team ERA. Texas is 30-8 and 11-6 in the SEC, good for third in the conference behind No.5 Georgia, which is 13-5 and 32-10, and No.7 A&M, which is at 12-5 and 31-7. We are in 11th place in the conference standings, so A LOT on the line on West End starting Friday.
We’re hitting .294 as a team and are 4th in the country in home runs with 87. Defense is solid at .975, and we turn a ton of double plays. Defense could even be a little sharper, but it was very sharp against Kentucky and Xavier.
The pitching ERA is where we need to pick it up. It’s at 5.38 right now. We’ve Got to get better on the mound if we want to have a highly successful season. We’ve had some injuries, but now have guys coming back, and we’re pitching four or five freshmen, so it’s been a learning curve. But now is the time for the staff to step it up. The freshmen have been through a lot of battles in the pre-conference and now in the SEC. So, they’re veterans at this point despite the fact that they’re freshmen. They’re just going to have to lock it down. We’ve got to have those young guys and the veterans produce for us to have good, if not great success this season. The talent is there. Just need to be mentally tough on the hill and throw strikes and let our defense make plays. Connor is definitely giving us that. Fennell is our leader on the staff. Our other juniors and underclassmen have to follow suit.
I’ll have more on our team through the weekend.
I’ll have more on “By,” Coach Mark Byington, and the men’s bball team coming up Friday. By was extended by Candice and rewarded our program and our University for it by pulling in a tremendous incoming freshmen and transfer class. I’ll have many more details on what By has done. Keeping Tyler Tanner as a Dore is preeminent in our plans for 2026-27. Tyler did not transfer, so it’s a matter of if we can keep him from going to the NBA. There are deadlines for declaring for the draft and staying in. I think we’ve got a shot to keep him and possibly get AK Okereke back. AK is trying to win his case in court for an extra year of eligibility. Will get into more detail on Men’s bball Friday. It’s going very well. By’s the man.
It was such a downer losing to Nebraska because I loved the guys on the team and they had such a sensational season. Sorry to see Tyler Nickel, and Devin McGlockton have to move on due to the fact that they’re out of eligibility. Nickel is kind of up in the air still though. He probably won’t be back, but there’s talk of him trying to get another year of eligibility. He was a little erratic as a shooter, but gave great effort and was a leader. Glock was a terrific leader and teammate and gave us a lot. I really liked what Jalen Washington did, too, in his one season as a Commodore. Wish those guys all the very best and will be pulling for them in their future endeavors. Will get more in depth on our newcomers Friday.
Football had an awesome spring. Clark has this program fine tuned to be a powerhouse in the near future. I love what five star freshman quarterback Jared Curtis can do for us. The QB competition is still ongoing into August, and we’ve got three other pretty good players. Curtis has the most talent. He can really sling it. Can a freshman quarterback really lead his team to prominence in the SEC? If anybody can do it, Jared can. It’s not a done deal, but I’m banking on Jared being our starting QB in game one vs. Austin Peay at FirstBank on Saturday, Sept 5th. And the talent around Jared, or whomever it is, is as good as we’ve ever had. The defense is loaded, too. We’ll have to fine tune our offensive line, but there’s great size and ability, and plenty of depth. And I’m a huge fan of O Line coach Chris Klenakis. With Coach Klenakis, and OC Tim Beck at the helm, and our chief Consultant to Clark and senior offensive Advisor Jerry Kill, we’ll have good offense. Seddy Alexander, MK Young and Junior Sherrill are back among others. I like our material on offense. And Clark and DC Steve Gregory can do super things with our talent on defense. Our defense can be elite. Couldn’t be going any better in football.
Our Men’s Golf team shot 9 under today in the second round of the SEC Tournament at Sea Island Golf Club at St. Simons Island, GA. and are in 9th place heading into Friday’s final round of stroke play at 11 under. We are one shot back of 8th place South Carolina, which is at -12. The top 8 finishers in stroke play matriculate to the Match Play on Saturday and Sunday. There are quarterfinal and semifinal matches on Saturday, and the Championship Match is Sunday. I like where Coach Scott Limbaugh and our team stands heading into Friday.
We are ranked 11th in the country. We have really improved throughout the season. We’ve got a young team, for the most part, as two freshmen are in the starting lineup of 5 players in the team competition. But the two freshmen were 2 of the three players in the No.1 recruiting class in the country in 2025, so they know what it takes. But our senior from West Point, Mississippi, Wells Williams, has been the story for our team through the first two rounds. Wells is at nine under for the tournament, and tied for fourth, three shots back of Auburn stud Jackson Kolvun.
We’ll need Wells, freshman Will Hartman, from Marvin, N.C., who is at -4, freshman Jon Ed Steed from Enterprise, Alabama, who has been superb for us this season, junior Chase Nevins, from Great Falls, VA. and sophomore Ryan Downes, from Longmeadow, Massachusetts, to lock down tomorrow and get us into the match play, where it’s anybody’s game then. No.1 Auburn leads the team leaderboard at -27.
Will have more VU Confidential stuff Friday with the 2026-27 Basketball team makeup, more on these tremendous signees, and a running diatribe (not overkill, but up to date information) on the Men’s golf team as they home in on round 3 and advancing to Match Play.
Thanks, have a great evening and Anchor Down.