What went wrong in Tennessee baseball's series loss to Texas A&M: Vols got 'teeth kicked in'

Brayden Krenzel got the result he wanted. It just didn’t end well.

The Tennessee baseball pitcher got Texas A&M’s Jace LaViolette to hit a grounder on a changeup. But the potential inning-ending double play clipped Krenzel’s foot and scooted away from shortstop Ariel Antigua.

Wyatt Henseler hit a three-run home run three pitches later, doubling a three-run lead and Tennessee unraveled. 

“In baseball, you are going to have days where you get your teeth kicked in,” Tennessee utility Dalton Bargo said. “That is what happened today.”

Tennessee was crushed Saturday in a fashion rarely seen under coach Tony Vitello. The No. 1 Vols (28-4, 9-3 SEC) lost the first game of a doubleheader 9-3 to the Aggies. They lost 17-6 in the second game, allowing the most runs in a game since Vitello’s first season in 2018 and losing a home series for the first time in two years.

“They played better than us,” Vitello said. “We happened to play two games in one day and it was not a good day for us and it was a very good day for them.”

The core of what happened at Lindsey Nelson Stadium was the consensus preseason No. 1 team played like it for the first time. The Aggies (16-15, 3-9) have struggled all season. The Vols no-hit and run-ruled them Friday, which was a good depiction of Texas A&M’s season under first-year coach Michael Earley.

They didn’t struggle Saturday, which was a good depiction of what was expected all along from the Aggies.

Unfortunately for Tennessee, they were on the receiving end of two months of frustration.

“Man to man, they beat us,” Vitello said. “But if there’s any one complaint, it was a little casual, the first couple innings of Game 2 in particular for following a loss.”

Tennessee had its issues in the doubleheader as its win streak in SEC series halted at 12.

It had sloppy play in the field in the first game with two eighth-inning errors that put the game out of reach. It had some bad breaks like Krenzel’s foot negating a double play and Hunter Ensley barely missing a diving catch in the first inning of the second game. 

The pitching was obliterated by the Aggies. UT had allowed 17 homers in 30 games. It allowed 11 in two games Saturday, including seven in Game 2 — six of which were in two innings. 

Vitello summed it up as Tennessee leaving pitches over the middle of the plate against good hitters who took calm swings. Tennessee didn’t do the same, Bargo expressed.

Consequently, Tennessee’s loss total doubled from two to four in a matter of hours.

“You can’t go home and bang your head up against the wall,” Vitello said. “You got to see where we’re at with this season and then hope that we’re more determined than ever this week and we make it a good week.”

Tennessee’s only two prior losses were one-run defeats against ESTU and Alabama in mid-March.

The sky is hardly falling on the Vols because one of the nation’s most talented teams had a get-right series at their expense. But the mixture of casual play, rough pitching and miscues isn’t a positive one. It also hasn’t been the norm through 32 games.

The norm has been what Vitello described. It’s a good group of players with a complementary blend of defense, pitching and hitting. It has a dose of grit and chemistry that works with the talent to elevate the roster even more. 

“But we can’t show up and rely on what’s on paper,” Vitello said.

That is the lesson the Vols have to take from a rough day to get the results they want — and for it to end well.

Mike Wilson covers University of Tennessee athletics. Email him at michael.wilson@knoxnews.com and follow him on X @ByMikeWilson or Bluesky @bymikewilson.bsky.social. If you enjoy Mike’s coverage, consider a digital subscription that will allow you access to all of it.