SEC Baseball Tournament 2015: Wednesday Scores, Updated Bracket and Schedule
The SEC is always one of the best baseball conferences in the country, and 2015 has proven to be no different. Wednesday is the second day of action from Hoover Metropolitan Stadium, with top-seeded LSU taking its first step toward securing an automatic berth in the NCAA tournament.
The Tigers won't be able to coast on their stellar 46-9 regular season record, as Vanderbilt, Texas A&M and Florida also began their journeys to winning an SEC championship.
One silver lining for teams that aren't successful Wednesday is that they aren't done. After Tuesday's opening-day, single-elimination round, the remaining eight teams are playing a double-elimination format that gives them some wiggle room in the event of one bad day.
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LSU should be the favorite as the No. 1 seed and after winning this tournament each of the last two years, but the depth in the SEC doesn't make the Tigers a lock.
Here's how things played out on the second day of SEC action from Hoover, Alabama.
| Game | Matchup | Result/Start Time (ET) |
| No. 5 | No. 3 Texas A&M Aggies vs. No. 11 Alabama Crimson Tide | Texas A&M def. Alabama, 4-3 |
| No. 6 | No. 2 Vanderbilt Commodores vs. No. 7 Missouri Tigers | Vanderbilt def. Missouri, 7-6 |
| No. 7 | No. 1 LSU Tigers vs. No. 9 Auburn Tigers | LSU def. Auburn, 9-8 |
| No. 8 | No. 4 Florida Gators vs. No. 5 Arkansas Razorbacks | Arkansas def. Florida, 7-6 |
Tournament Bracket
| 1st Round | 2nd Round | 3rd Round | 4th Round | Semifinals | Final |
| (6) Ole Miss | (11) Alabama | ||||
| (11) Alabama | (11) Alabama | (7) Missouri | |||
| (3) Texas A&M | Game 9 Winner | Game 11 Winner | |||
| (7) Missouri | (9) Auburn | Game 11 Loser | Game 13 Winner | ||
| (10) USC | (7) Missouri | (4) Florida | |||
| (2) Vanderbilt | TBD | ||||
| (8) Kentucky | (3) Texas A&M | TBD | |||
| (9) Auburn | (9) Auburn | (2) Vanderbilt | Game 10 Winner | Game 12 Winner | |
| (1) LSU | Game 12 Loser | Game 14 Winner | |||
| (5) Arkansas | (1) LSU | ||||
| (12) Tennessee | (5) Arkansas | (4) Arkansas | |||
| (4) Florida |
Day 2 Recap
No. 5 Arkansas def. No. 4 Florida 7-6
Arkansas scored three runs in the top of the ninth and fended off a Florida comeback effort to earn a 7-6 win over the Gators early Thursday morning. The lengthy game lasted well past the midnight hour, with only a few straggling fans seeing yet another thriller conclude in Hoover.
Andrew Benintendi and Bobby Wernes each hit home runs off Gators reliever Bobby Poyner to make the comeback. Benintendi knocked a solo shot as the leadoff hitter for his 18th of the season, while Poyner hit the game-winning shot with Rick Nomura on base.
The see-saw contest saw both teams disappointed by their starting pitching. Arkansas' Keaton McKinney lost total control and lasted only an inning, allowing three runs and walking as many batters. Florida's Dane Dunning lasted an extra 0.1 innings but also allowed three runs.
The two sides battled deadlocked at 3-3 until the fifth inning, where it appeared Florida pulled ahead for good. JJ Schwarz and Mike Rivera each hit run-scoring doubles as part of a three-run inning.
Brett McAfee hit an RBI single to bring Arkansas within a 6-4 deficit, helping lead to Arkansas' surprising comeback.
No. 1 LSU def. No. 9 Auburn, 9-8
Four innings in, it looked like we were headed for the biggest upset of the SEC Tournament. Buoyed by a five-run first inning, Auburn built a 8-3 lead heading into the fifth.
Then things fell apart.
LSU mounted a torrid comeback in the fifth, scoring six runs to retake the lead and carrying that advantage to a 9-8 triumph Wednesday. Conner Hale, Jared Foster and Chris Sciambra each drove in two runs for the nation's top-ranked team.
"Somehow, we just found a way to win the game," LSU head coach Paul Mainieri told reporters after the game. "That to me is a credit to our kids—they really hang in there. Our guys don't flinch. They know we have a good offensive team and they're not going to give up when we fall behind like that."
Mainieri was forced to use seven different pitchers, which could have an effect later in the tournament. Starter Jared Poche lasted only one inning, Jake Godfrey had just two innings' of work in him and five pitchers combined to hold Auburn to one unearned the rest of the way. Doug Norman was awarded the victory.
"For our team, it's more, 'Hey we can play with these guys,'" Auburn star Jordan Ebert said, per . "If that's the best team in the country, I think we have a good shot to do some things that a lot of people didn't think we could do. I hope and think our team is taking this as a positive and I think this really shows we're better than we think we are."
Auburn will have its fingers crossed that it can build on that momentum as it faces elimination. Meanwhile, LSU escapes and should use this as a learning experience as it prepares for top overall seeding in the NCAAs.
No. 2 Vanderbilt def. No. 7 Missouri, 7-6
If the Missouri Tigers bow out of the SEC tournament on Thursday, this loss against Vanderbilt will haunt the program for a long time.
The Tigers had the defending national champion Commodores down to their final strike on two different occasions in the bottom of the ninth, but a fielding error in center field following a single by Penn Murfee allowed the tying run to score.
After Missouri went 1-2-3 in the top of the 10th inning, Rhett Wiseman played hero leading off the bottom of the inning, via Kendall Rogers of D1Baseball.com:
Even though Wiseman was the hero, Dansby Swanson was the star for Vanderbilt. The potential top-five pick in June's MLB draft hit two home runs, becoming the first player to pull that off since 2009, per the SEC Network:
Missouri shouldn't have been in the position to lose this game in extra innings. The Tigers held a 6-2 lead heading into the bottom of the seventh inning, but the bullpen and defense didn't provide any support to starter Peter Fairbanks after he struck out 10 in 5.2 innings.
The Tigers will have a chance to right the ship against Alabama on Thursday, but they are walking a tight rope in the double-elimination format.
Vanderbilt will take on Texas A&M in the winner's bracket, in a matchup of two offenses firing on all cylinders right now. It should be an exciting battle between two of the country's best teams, regardless of which one comes out on top.
No. 3 Texas A&M def. No. 11 Alabama, 4-3
Texas A&M overcame an early 3-0 deficit to secure its first victory of the SEC tournament with a 4-3 win over Alabama. An RBI single from Nick Banks in the bottom of the eighth inning gave the Aggies a much needed win to avoid playing in the loser's game Thursday.
Alabama had an opportunity to tie the game in the top of the ninth inning as it put men on first and second with one out. Will Haynie lined a single into left field, but Logan Taylor threw a one-hopper to the plate that beat Daniel Cucjen for the second out.
Aggies closer Andrew Vinson would load the bases after hitting the next batter and fell behind Chandler Avant 2-0 before getting him to pop out on the fourth pitch of the at-bat to end the game.
Taylor was the big hero of the game for Texas A&M. In addition to his game-saving throw in the ninth inning, he provided the game-tying RBI, with Kendall Rogers of D1Baseball.com noting how quickly this offense can strike:
The Aggies appeared to be in trouble right out of the gate, as Cody Henry gave the Crimson Tide a 1-0 lead in the second inning with an RBI double. They would go up 3-0 in the third as Aggies starter Grayson Long lost command of the strike zone.
Long would right the ship in a hurry, as Michael Lananna of Baseball America tweeted out the right-hander's final stat line:
This win is everything Texas A&M head coach Rob Childress could have asked for, especially how it played out late. One week ago, after losing two of three games against South Carolina, Childress told Brent Zwerneman of The Houston Chronicle that pitching and defense let the team down:
"From an offensive standpoint, we did enough to win the series, or even sweep the series. We just weren’t very good in other facets – the most important facets. ... We had our shots and had the guys at the plate that we wanted , but we have to be better on the mound and better defensively on the weekend to deserve a chance to win a series.
"
Fast forward to Texas A&M's biggest moment of the year thus far, as Taylor made a tremendous throw to prevent Alabama from tying the game, and Vinson made the pitch he needed to secure the victory.
There's a lot of work to be done for the Aggies after coming out of the gate shaky and surviving in the ninth inning, but they still got the victory and can rest easy before playing Thursday.
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