Freshman Jack Findley led Notre Dame to a 7-3 victory over No. 1 seeded Tennessee in the championship game with five shutout innings and back-to-back home runs from seventh-ranked catchers David Lamanna and Jack Brannigan. Knoxville Super Regional on Sunday.
Notre Dame (40-15) will participate in the third College World Series. Other tours of The Fighting Irish took place in 1957 and 2002.
Findley (6-2) stunned after entering the game with no runs at the bottom of the fifth inning, one run-in and the other runner trailing 3-1. Findley stopped the volunteers from there, killed four and allowed two more to walk. He ended the game with a double.
Findley’s opportunity on the mound gave Notre Dame a chance to rally.
Carter Putz doubled Volunteers starter Chase Burns (8-2) to seventh with an out and a two-out shot from Lamanna in the right field to level the game at 3-3. Braninigan chased the left-center with a 1-2 go-forward shot on the pitch.
Findley retired below the rankings, and Notre Dame added three big insurance runs in the eighth.
Camden Sewell started the innings by beating Brooks Coetzee on the pitch. Spencer Myers’ sacrifice put Coetzee in second place. Ryan Cole came first and Koetzi blocked a mistake by Walls’ third baseman Trey Lipscomb. Kirby Connell replaced Sewell and runner-up Jared Miller led the sack bunt. Putz saw the first pitch for a double for two, and Jack Ziska hit a single on Putz to increase the score. All three were unbeaten.
Luke Lipsius took first place to give Wales a 1-0 lead. Lemanna tied for second with a RBI ground out. Seth Stephenson’s RBI singles and fifth-run double at the bottom of the left gave Tennessee a 3-1 lead.
Notre Dame head coach Link Jarrett described Tennessee as the “No. 1 team in any college game of the year” and entered the Super Regional. Instead, for the first time in 20 years, Irish players will play in the CWS.
Tennessee (57-9) finished second straight in the CWS and struggled for sixth place overall. Notre Dame beat the Volunteers 8-6 on Friday. Tennessee won the second game 12-4. Volunteers led the country in home runs and earned averages by entering the Super Regional Play. Tennessee took the lead after six innings and entered the game 49-0.
Reported by the Associated Press.
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