Texas A&M Baseball falls short in longest game in school history

Texas A&M baseball lost an 18-inning midweek contest to UT-Arlington. The marathon game was the longest in school history.

It started on March 13, 2018 at about 6:30 pm and went into the next day. The 18-inning affair goes down as the longest game in Texas A&M history. Unfortunately, it will not be remembered well – the Aggies fell to UTA 5-1.

Many things were yelled at the other team throughout the game including things regarding sunflower seeds, their coach looking like a lizard, the Aggie rendition of the Canadian national anthem, and we even had a Chinese fire drill. Oh, and we watched an incredibly long baseball game.

The Texas A&M Aggies and the UT-Arlington Mavericks faced off in a mid-week, spring break match on Tuesday. If you are a fan of a defensive ball game, then this game was made for you. It was nothing but defense for the first nine innings of the game. And then, for the most part, the next nine were nothing but defense as well.

This was a huge surprise to most Aggie baseball fans. The Ags were dominant over the weekend against Long Beach State who are, in all honesty, a solid ball club. The Mavs came into College Station with a 4-9 record and had lost to more than one sub-par team. Most people were expecting a glorified batting practice, or at least I was.

A little bit of bat, a whole lot of glove

On the contrary, the Aggies came out flat on offense and the bats just weren’t going for them. However, for most of the game, the defense was spectacular for both teams. Both teams were on the brink of scoring a few times but quick gloves by both teams’ middle infielders saved the runs.

In the top of the seventh, the Mavs had a lightning-fast runner on second with only one out. But after a strikeout, the runner got too brave on his extra lead and was caught in a pickle between second and third resulting in the third out of the inning. I also have to tip my hat the Mavs’ second basemen for having a good day in the field and giving the Ags a tough time.

You live by defensive play, and you die by defensive play

That’s how the Aggies died in the 18th inning. A fly ball to left field got away from Baine Schoenvogel allowing the Mavs to score and it was all downhill from there. A base knock allowed another Mav to come home making it 2-0. A wild throw home on a chopper to first allowed two more guys to come across the plate. Finally, a fielder’s choice let another run cross the plate making it 5-0 going into the bottom of the 18th.

Next: Scouting Aggie MBB first round opponent, Providence

The deflated Ags managed to get Chandler Morris to come around and avoid the shutout but that was the only run the Aggies managed to buy. On Wednesday the game finally ended with a score of 5-1 (Full Box). Even though this was certainly not what the Aggies had in mind, they’ll use this as a great learning moment to push them into this weekend’s series as they open up SEC play at Auburn.