FAYETTEVILLE — Although he had been getting on base, Casey Opitz was hitless for the series going into his final at bat Sunday afternoon.
The sophomore delivered in the clutch, though, hitting a walk-off single to lift Arkansas to a 3-2 win and complete an SEC-opening sweep over Missouri. It’s the third straight year the Razorbacks have gotten off to a 3-0 start in conference play.
Opitz - who was 0 for 7 with three walks and a hit by pitch in the series going into the at bat - watched two curveballs go over the plate for strikes and a third just miss the zone before driving a fourth straight curveball through the right side and past a diving second baseman.
“That was close,” Opitz said. “I was watching it and kind of freaking out, but they were playing up the middle a lot, so I knew once I pulled it that it had a pretty good chance of sneaking through there.”
The hit scored Curtis Washington Jr., who pinch ran for Heston Kjerstad following his leadoff single. It proved to be a critical move by head coach Dave Van Horn because Trevor Ezell - considered the best bunter on the team - popped up a sacrifice attempt in front of the plate and the catcher nearly turned the double play.
However, Washington slid back safely and ended up moving into scoring position when Dominic Fletcher reached on a catcher’s interference.
Missouri made the rally necessary in the top of the ninth when designated hitter Peter Zimmermann, playing with a broken foot, crushed a two-run home run over the center field wall off Jacob Kostyshock with one out in the top of the ninth to tie the game.
“Zimmermann, who is awfully, awfully strong, got a fastball up and hit it out dead center and we’re tied,” Van Horn said. “Just proud of the team for rallying the troops there in the bottom of the ninth.”
Next up for the Razorbacks (17-2, 3-0 SEC) is a two-game midweek series at No. 15 Texas, which begins a six-game road trip that includes a series at Alabama and concludes with a midweek game at Missouri State. Both games have a 6:30 p.m. first pitch and will be televised on the Longhorn Network.
Hogs End Perfect Game Bid
For a while, it didn’t look like Arkansas was going to get anything going offensively. Missouri starter Tyler LaPlante retired the first 15 batters he faced, taking a perfect game into the sixth inning.
Not only was he mowing down the Razorbacks, but he was doing it so efficiently that Van Horn thought he might throw a complete game. LaPlante needed no more than 12 pitches in any of the first five innings and was sitting at 51 total for the game.
Most of his outs were lazy fly balls and soft ground balls that the Tigers easily fielded, as he was a prototypical “crafty lefty” who wasn’t too concerned with strikeouts, Van Horn said.
“He pitched like a senior, a veteran,” Van Horn said. “He kept moving us around - every time we thought we were getting a changeup, he’d bust fastball in on us and we never really got good swings.”
The Razorbacks finally broke up the perfect game in the sixth inning and did so in impressive fashion, with Jack Kenley crushing a 1-1 fastball off the scoreboard for a solo shot. That moves him into a tie with Casey Martin for the team lead with four home runs.
“It looked like he tried to slip one by him after a couple of breaking balls and a changeup,” Van Horn said. “Jack didn’t miss it. That was really good to see because he had been struggling a little bit, especially against lefties.”
That somewhat opened the flood gates, as Jacob Nesbit followed with a flare over the second baseman and moved to second on a wild pitch. LaPlante retired the next two batters and appeared to get out of it when Heston Kjerstad hit a short dribbler up the first base line.
Kjerstad beat the throw from the catcher, though, and as Missouri protested the call, Nesbit rounded third. He got halfway down the line and stopped to head back to third base, even though no one was covering home plate.
Van Horn said he’s not sure why Nesbit stopped, but he still managed to score with the first baseman’s throw sailed over the pitcher running in to cover the plate.
“I had a little brain fart for sure,” Nesbit said. “I was a little confused by it. We were fortunate to get that run in and after everything simmered down, it was really cool.”
Scroggins’ Start
For the second straight week, Cody Scroggins’ first pitch of the game hit the leadoff batter - “I’m starting to get really annoyed I keep on hitting the first batter,” he joked afterward - but he settled in after that.
The next five batters struck out, with a strike ‘em out, throw ‘em out by Opitz mixed in, to get Scroggins through two innings and then he worked around a two-out walk and fielding error in the third.
“Really the first three innings his stuff was electric,” Van Horn said. “He was throwing the ball in the mid-90s with a plus-plus changeup and a really good slider and racked up a lot of strikeouts.”
Scroggins said it actually wasn’t until the fourth that he got control of his fastball, which probably helped him get out of the jam he found himself in that inning.
With one out, he walked Chris Cornelius and then gave up back-to-back hits to Chad McDaniel and Tony Ortiz. A sliding stop by Jack Kenley on the second hit prevented a run from scoring, but the bases were still loaded.
Pop outs by Mark Vierling and Zimmermann got Scroggins out of that situation and then he ended his outing with consecutive strikeouts following a one-out hit by Josh Holt Jr. in the fifth.
That gave him seven strikeouts across five scoreless innings in which he allowed three hits and two walks.
“I didn’t really have control of my fastball in the beginning, so I started relying on my off-speed a little bit and good thing I had control of that,” Scroggins said. “I knew it was going to be kind of a grind because I couldn’t find my command quick enough, but I started feeling that around the fourth inning.”
Over his last two starts, Scroggins has struck out 18 batters and given up only five hits and three walks in 11 scoreless innings, proving to be a solid No. 3 starter for the Razorbacks.
Other Tidbits
~Another beautiful day in Fayetteville led to another great crowd at Baum-Walker Stadium, with a paid attendance of 9,281. There appeared to be many more fans at the game than the “tickets scanned” number of 6,345.
~With a single in the sixth inning, Nesbit extended his hitting streak to nine games and on-base streak to 16 games. In fact, he has reached base in 18 of 19 games this season and the only time he failed to do so was the Eastern Illinois game in which he laid down two sacrifice bunts.
~Arkansas issued a free pass - two walks and a hit by pitch - to the first batter in all three games of the series, but got an unconventional double play to escape all three first innings unscathed. The Friday and Sunday games featured a strike ‘em out, throw ‘em out, while Saturday’s was aided by a runner’s interference. None of them are officially considered double plays.
~Preseason All-American Kameron Misner, who came into the series hitting .393, went 0 for 12 with three strikeouts in three games against the Razorbacks.
~The Razorbacks’ pitchers combined for 32 strikeouts and only seven walks in the series, improving their season strikeout-to-walk ratio to 4.13. They came into the weekend ranked sixth nationally in that category.
BOX SCORE
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