April 9, 2008

Recap | Box Score

Baylor head coach Steve Smith:

On tonight's game:

"If they hadn't kicked it around and walked us as much as they did, we would've had a really difficult time winning the game. I don't feel like we didn't do enough offensively to win the game, but we didn't do anything defensively or on the mound to lose it, and they did. A lot of times that's way a baseball game turns out."

On the Bears scoring all six runs in the first three innings:

"In hindsight, the runs we got early in the game were the difference in the game. We left a lot of guys on (base). We had our three-hole hitter at the plate (Dustin Dickerson) with a 2-1 count and the bases loaded, and we get jammed and hit into a double play to end an inning. That doesn't happen on the reverse side. I can't remember the last time we got somebody's three-hole hitter to have an at bat like that, but that's just the way it happens."

On Randall Linebaugh's performance:

"The difference in this game was Randall Linebaugh, and it's not close. They had their chance when he walked a leadoff guy. They got a hit, and then they do something we were not able to do, which is sacrifice bunt. They've got runners at second and third with one out, and he absolutely willed himself that they weren't going to get that run in, and he struck those two guys out. He had enough ammunition left to go two more innings. He was far and away the most competitive guy that we've put on the mound, maybe all year. What he did out there was big-time."