Hogs' coach Dave Van Horn on win over McNeese State on Sunday
Last non-conference series of the season wrapped up with 18-5 win over Cowboys as bats come alive again.
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00 I just really liked the way our team responded after we gave up the four run lead.
00:04 We had a four run lead and we had a three run lead and cruising along pretty good there
00:10 for about 30 minutes.
00:11 And then they put together a really good inning.
00:14 Started with a walk and Molina was struggling with his control with the fastball and getting
00:22 behind hitters and they made him pay a little bit.
00:25 So when they scored four, we came back and scored six.
00:30 I think we'd scored a couple and then got some really big hits there.
00:35 I don't know.
00:36 It was just good to see our team respond like that because we hadn't had too much adversity
00:40 where we'd blown a lead or made some mistakes that have cost us.
00:45 And it's like I told them after the game, I said, "It's not going to be easy.
00:49 Every game you're going to have to fight and come from behind."
00:52 And I like the way that we didn't panic.
00:54 We just said, "Hey, let's find a way to get something going here."
00:59 And they did it.
01:00 And it was great that Gage came in, settled in a little bit, throwing a lot of strikes,
01:05 didn't mean to walk anybody and just gave us a chance to build that lead and then finish
01:13 it off.
01:14 And it was really neat that we had an opportunity to bring Dylan Carter in.
01:17 A lot of his family's here.
01:20 They knew that he was going to be available to pitch this weekend.
01:24 And he's a guy that I don't know if I've ever seen anybody rehab as hard as he has.
01:28 And everything worked out.
01:31 He's throwing the ball every bit as hard as he did last year, maybe even a little bit
01:36 harder.
01:37 And he'll end up being a big part of our bullpen if he can continue to build off what we've
01:44 seen over the last couple of weeks when he's been throwing to live hitters and then now
01:48 in a game.
01:49 And just wanted him to get that under his belt and all that emotion and now get him
01:54 ready to maybe come in in a leverage-type situation.
01:58 But it was a good weekend for us, obviously.
02:00 We won them all, played fairly well, pitched fairly well, but not great.
02:06 But we got some pitchers that know how to get out of jams, and they held them down this
02:10 weekend.
02:11 You had 13 two-out runs today.
02:13 You got 23 for the weekend.
02:15 What was the key?
02:16 Just a lot of clutch hits.
02:18 And I made that comment last night.
02:20 I didn't want to talk to the team too long after the games yesterday because we've been
02:23 here for 10-plus hours.
02:25 So just kind of talked real quick.
02:27 I knew they were going to talk with their position coaches, and we needed to get out
02:32 of here and get ready for today.
02:33 But that's what I mentioned yesterday.
02:37 We got a lot of big hits.
02:38 And then today, same thing.
02:42 We just -- I don't know.
02:45 Concentration level, you got to be good, a little bit lucky.
02:49 We got big, big hits with two outs and kept adding to leads.
02:54 And starting the game one yesterday with a couple of singles that scored the first two
03:00 runs, I think, of the game for us.
03:02 And what looked like it was going to be a pitchers' duel, and that's what it ended up
03:05 being.
03:06 So you know how that goes.
03:08 It kind of comes and goes.
03:10 But it's really good to see it because we hadn't had that a whole lot this year.
03:15 We'd won some games, but you think about that 14-inning game against Oklahoma State.
03:20 We had runner after runner after runner on base, and we could not buy a hit.
03:26 So sometimes it evens up a little bit.
03:28 >> Does Ross Loveless want you to continue playing against us against like this?
03:31 >> Yeah, I mean, Ross is a tough out.
03:34 He just brings a lot to the table.
03:37 He's going to get his time, that's for sure.
03:40 Whether we platoon there or however we handle it, I think, you know, I know what Ross can
03:47 do, and I was really good to see Wilmsmeyer have a good day because he's, like I said,
03:51 he's our best defender in center.
03:52 We've been struggling at the plate a little bit.
03:54 I think when he got that two-strike, two-out hit that gave us the lead, I think, there,
04:00 that was really big for his confidence.
04:02 And then obviously we scored more after that, and then he had a good day.
04:07 He had a good day for us.
04:09 >> Yeah, this was kind of the first time all season where you've stacked two consecutive
04:14 offensive performances.
04:16 How good was that to see?
04:17 I know you didn't talk to the guys much, but has that been maybe a challenge for them to
04:20 kind of string together this kind of offense?
04:23 >> Yeah, you know, we talked Thursday at practice for a little while with the whole team.
04:27 A lot of times the team split up the pitchers all together, the position players are doing
04:31 their thing, and then we come and do defense together.
04:34 We did that on Thursday, and that gave me an opportunity to talk to the team just about
04:37 kind of what I'd seen the first few weeks.
04:40 And we need to pick up a few things, maybe play a little more emotion.
04:45 We don't play every day.
04:46 We're not like big leaguers yet, these guys.
04:48 And so you got to show up, you got to get after it.
04:53 And I think we did a great job of really being into every game mentally.
05:01 I think the team grew a little bit as a team this weekend, a little more emotion.
05:07 It was fun in the dugout with these guys.
05:11 >> I mean, Kendall has just been so consistent, right?
05:15 The power maybe is still waiting to really bust out.
05:18 But what have you seen from him in the middle of the lineup?
05:20 I mean, he's hitting 360.
05:22 It seems like he's kind of going a little under the radar right now with his production.
05:26 >> Well, he just, you know, every day gives you something.
05:29 It seems like whether he drives in a run with a sack fly or maybe takes a couple of walks,
05:35 he doesn't go out of the zone too much.
05:39 He knows there's a guy behind him.
05:41 And that's what we want our guys to do.
05:42 Don't try to do too much.
05:43 If you're not getting a pitch to hit or take your walk or whatever.
05:47 I think that's why Kendall's been maybe a little, like you said, under the radar.
05:53 But he's hitting 350 or whatever.
05:57 And we know that he's a guy that we got to have in the middle of the order.
06:01 We felt like when we got Stovall back, we could push Kendall down a little bit where
06:06 maybe he would get more opportunities to drive in runs.
06:09 Because I'm sure if you look at his opportunities to drive in runs, he's pretty good at it.
06:14 He was last year.
06:15 So it's good to see him get a couple of hits tonight.
06:19 It's good to see him hit that ball a long way last night to end that game and continue
06:23 to gain a lot of confidence.
06:26 Going off that, I think it was Monday you said Diggs and McLaughlin had good numbers,
06:29 but they weren't really hitting the ball the way that you knew they were capable of.
06:32 Do you feel like these last two days are more of what you expected from those?
06:35 Hit a lot of balls hard?
06:36 Yeah.
06:37 Yeah.
06:38 I mean, even McLaughlin, Aloy, I mean, these guys, they popped the ball pretty good.
06:45 McLaughlin lined out the left twice hard last night.
06:48 And Aloy popped two or three balls deep to left.
06:53 The left fielder's playing almost on the warning track.
06:56 You know, off the bat you're thinking it's going to go over somebody's head, but they're
06:58 already standing back there.
07:00 And it's good to see him, you know, to do that.
07:03 Take a couple walks.
07:05 You know, we feel like we have a pretty good lineup, and we just got to get some guys rolling
07:10 a little bit.
07:11 And I felt like this weekend, I mean, the last 24 hours really, it was a really good
07:17 start.
07:18 Now, you know, on Tuesday we're going to play Ole Roberts, and this is a team that competed
07:21 in the College World Series last year, so they know how to win and fight you a little
07:25 bit.
07:26 And, you know, we'll have a – hopefully we can keep it up on Tuesday and get ready
07:30 for our SEC play this next weekend.
07:33 Stoveball coming back up.
07:34 I would assume he would move back to second base soon, and Holt hasn't been playing
07:37 it done.
07:38 Is a little bit of that just you know what you have with Peyton Holt, and so you want
07:40 to get some of these other guys to play to see what you're doing?
07:41 Yeah, a little bit.
07:42 Yeah.
07:43 And, you know, Peyton, I mean, got two or three hits yesterday and then didn't play
07:46 today and, you know, worked hard pregame and knew he wasn't playing, so I appreciate
07:50 that.
07:51 You know, Peyton will move back over to second shortly and, you know, is trying to get Suess
07:56 and some more bats.
07:57 And, I mean, he's a guy that I think he's a real threat at the plate, especially against
08:02 right-handed pitching.
08:03 And, you know, he showed me something today.
08:05 You know, he's struck out twice in one inning and he left some runners out there.
08:10 And his next two at-bats, he wasn't up there chasing hits and going out of the zone.
08:14 And I'm pretty sure he walked the next two at-bats.
08:17 And I really like that.
08:19 It just shows that little maturity there at the plate.
08:24 So it's something that he can build off of.
08:27 But he's just swung the bat well.
08:29 I want to continue to get him in the lineup.
08:31 And, you know, we're going to just try to get the guys in the lineup that can swing
08:35 the bat, athletic, you know.
08:36 And he's one of those guys.
08:37 I mean, he can steal a base or score from first on a double and, you know, slow you
08:42 down out there.
08:43 And, I mean, we're going to -- we'll find him a spot if he hits.
08:45 Speaking of that, you had, I believe, four lefties in the top five of the lineup.
08:49 And they had a lefty on the mound.
08:50 Did you like that matchup or was it just matchup?
08:52 Like, you know, just -- Yeah, you know, so we look at matchup stuff all the time.
08:58 He's only faced eight left-handed hitters all spring.
09:01 I think it was mostly against Texas A&M.
09:04 And those -- and they were four for eight on him.
09:07 And the right-handed hitters were only hitting about 150 against him.
09:11 So I just thought, you know, I'm going to play these guys.
09:13 We'll get -- let's try to get him out of the game.
09:15 Let's see if those, you know, if those splits are, you know, correct.
09:20 But I thought our lefty did a pretty good job against him.
09:22 It took a little bit.
09:23 But then they got on him.
09:24 They got the pitch count up and got him out of the game.
09:27 So, yeah, I wanted to hit the lefties against lefties because, you know, left-handed hitters
09:32 kind of got to -- especially the young ones.
09:34 They got to kind of show you that they can hit lefties.
09:37 So you guys had 26 men reach base, 10 of them which were walks.
09:41 And I remember you were talking about how maturity at the plate.
09:45 Just tell me about how the discipline at the plate has increased for the guys because
09:50 I remember you said a couple weeks ago that you guys are walking more than striking out.
09:53 Yeah, we've done a really good job of staying in the zone.
09:57 This team early in the season may be better than most that we've had here.
10:03 Guys are more patient, not chasing what, you know, we call it chasing hits when you're
10:08 struggling because we've had some good players that aren't hitting right now.
10:14 And they're not going out of the zone right now.
10:16 They just got to let it happen a little bit.
10:19 So you think about today's game, you know, yeah, we got our hits, but they set up the
10:24 beginnings for us with walks.
10:26 And our guys did that, you know, let the next guy get the job done, get hit by a pitch.
10:31 And advanced runners make contact, driving a run.
10:35 I mean, Lovic got behind in that last at bat and hit it off the end of the bat.
10:39 That threw him five change-ups in a row.
10:42 He got an RBI.
10:43 I mean, I know the game was pretty much in hand, but still, that's what you do.
10:48 You got to force him to get you out by throwing it over the plate.
10:52 I think we've done a great job with it.
10:54 That's just cool.
10:56 Do you sense an emotional boost with Stovall back in the lineup, just with the entire team?
11:01 Well, I think, yeah, I would say yes.
11:05 You got an older guy that was hurt last year after having a good freshman year, played
11:12 on a team that went to the World Series, played a position that he didn't ever play before.
11:17 He was our first baseman as a freshman on a team that was really good.
11:21 And came back, had a great fall his sophomore year.
11:26 And you're thinking, wow, this guy can really play second.
11:29 And then, you know, his shoulder's bugging him a little bit.
11:33 Tries to play and, you know, it's -- and he's done.
11:36 He had surgery, rehabbed super hard, you know, got a lot stronger.
11:41 You can see the ball jumping off his bat better than ever.
11:44 And swing's really pretty.
11:46 Got a pretty swing.
11:47 And, you know, the defensive thing for me is that, you know, brings a lot more experience
11:53 in the middle, turning double plays, everything.
11:56 Knowing where to be.
11:58 You know, it's -- I would say it's a big boost for our team mentally and physically on the
12:04 field.
12:05 I mean, it's a veteran guy that can swing the bat, that can play defense, and could
12:11 -- it makes our lineup longer and better.
12:16 - So before Peyton Stovall played this week, before Dylan Carter came back, you spoke confidently
12:20 about what you had seen from them in the live settings.
12:24 Is that you -- describe for us maybe what that looks like and what they had done before
12:30 we saw them in a game.
12:31 - Well, Dylan, you know, the last few weeks has thrown the live hitters on like Thursdays
12:35 on the way inside, maybe one outside, maybe three times.
12:39 So we're kind of like, wow, that's good enough to go.
12:42 Is he good?
12:43 And once he got released to go, you know, he said, I'm ready to go.
12:46 Well, let's -- you know, what I see him throw is kind of what you saw today, 92-94 with
12:51 the fastball, 83-84 slider.
12:55 I don't think he threw a slider this hard before.
12:58 And I could probably count on one hand how many 94-mile-an-hour fastballs he threw last
13:02 year.
13:03 He was mostly 92, 93, maybe 90.
13:06 Who knows when he was slowly getting hurt and when it was taken away from that.
13:09 But in that incredible rehab all summer here in fall and wanted to get back this year and
13:17 he did it.
13:18 And then Stovall, I mean, pretty much has been live at bats on Thursday.
13:23 And I think he got four or five at bats.
13:24 And I know three times, you know, we have our track man set up in there and he crushed
13:31 it.
13:32 He probably had two doubles and a homer.
13:34 And the homer was oppo.
13:35 I think it went like 380.
13:38 And the guys that were throwing were throwing good.
13:39 I mean, they were throwing the ball 92, 93, one left, one right.
13:46 And then one that wasn't throwing quite so hard, this kind of breaking ball changeup
13:50 guy.
13:51 And, you know, we were like, he's ready to play.
13:56 And so it was totally up to him on his foot.
13:59 And the doctors said, hey, you can DH him.
14:02 And really after yesterday, they told me I probably could have played him in the field
14:06 today, but he didn't.
14:07 I don't think he was quite ready to play in the field today.
14:09 Still looking around a little bit.
14:10 We're hoping he can play in the field on Tuesday.
14:12 How do you assess Mason pitch today?
14:16 I would say Mason did not command his fastball at all.
14:20 I mean, everything was up, but he's hard to hit when he's up, but he's got to be in the
14:23 zone.
14:24 But he had a lot of bad misses.
14:26 And those are the ones when I when you say a bad miss, the hitter is really not going
14:30 to swing at it.
14:31 He's not the first hitter of the game.
14:32 Check swing foul ball and then a check swing popped it up.
14:35 I think I don't know.
14:36 Maybe I don't know if that was first or second hitter, but there was just there was a you
14:42 know, just it was like it was like he was walking a tightrope there.
14:46 It was just just enough strikes.
14:49 And he came out in the third, popped some strikes early.
14:51 We're thinking, wow, OK, he's kind of got it together, but he just didn't have the command
14:55 he normally has.
14:56 But, you know, he did a good job of fighting him.
14:58 Gave us four innings, but they may finally got a couple of big hits on him on changeups
15:04 that he left up.
15:05 And then with Gage, it didn't go well for him.
15:07 You know, they're the first few hitters, but he ends up throwing somewhere around 70 percent
15:10 of his pitches for strikes.
15:12 Yeah, they went out of the zone a lot.
15:14 If he knows they chase it because his fastballs got carry on.
15:17 It looks good out of the hand where they were just guessing and they were just going all
15:21 out.
15:22 And yeah, I mean, he's hard to hit.
15:25 And I don't know, you know, I know that next week I feel like he'll be a lot better.