Tar Heels finally freeze Louisville’s hot hitting

Published Wednesday, June 20, 2007

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - North Carolina is proving the adage that good pitching beats good hitting any day.

The Tar Heels’ starters had been anything but good the last two weeks, and Louisville had the hottest hitting team in the NCAA Tournament.

But Luke Putkonen and two relievers limited the Cardinals to three hits, and the Tar Heels won 3-1 in a College World Series elimination game yesterday.

The Tar Heels also had three hits, but they made two runs that scored on a Louisville throwing error stand up to advance to today’s game against Rice. North Carolina (55-14), the 2006 runner-up, would have to beat the Owls twice to win their bracket and return to the best-of-three championship series, which starts Saturday.

Rice beat the Tar Heels 14-4 the first time they played Sunday.

"This game is crazy," North Carolina Coach Mike Fox said. "You can go from a game where you score a lot of runs to none, because it’s all controlled by that guy on the mound. I have a great deal of confidence in Luke. When he’s on, he has as good of stuff as anybody."

The Cardinals (47-24), who had batted .402 and scored 22 runs in their first two games, ended their first trip to the CWS with their fewest hits since getting three in a loss to St. John’s on May 5. They scored their fewest runs since a loss to Rutgers on May 25.

"Everybody putting in good at-bats for a long time is a hard thing," said Louisville’s Logan Johnson, whose first-inning homer was his CWS record-tying fourth in three games. "We ran into a good club, and they pitched well."

It was the second straight year that a team had three hits in a victory - Oregon State did it in a 2-0 win over Rice. In the CWS’ 61-year history, only one team has won with fewer hits. That was Southern California, which had two in a 5-3 win over BYU in 1968.

Before yesterday, no team in Fox’s nine years at North Carolina had won with so few.

"Pitching and defense are the name of the game, and we got those today," he said.

All of North Carolina’s scoring came with two outs in the second. Seth Williams hit a run-scoring single to center to tie it, and the go-ahead runs came in when Garrett Gore grounded to third, and Chris Dominguez threw wide of first baseman Daniel Burton.

"They jam a ball up the middle, and they cap a ball down the third-base line," Louisville Coach Dan McDonnell said. "Just a real tough play. Even if ‘Ming’ makes a great throw, I don’t know if we get him at first."

After Williams’ single, Colby Wark (3-4) and Gavin Logsdon held the Tar Heels hitless until Josh Horton doubled leading off the eighth.

The Cardinals threatened with two outs in the bottom half, but they stranded two runners when Isaiah Howes struck out against Andrew Carignan. Carignan, who relieved Rob Wooten, struck out three of his four batters for his 17th save.

● UC Irvine 8, Arizona St. 7 (10 inn.): That team with a funny nickname is serious about winning a national championship. The Anteaters won in their final at-bat for the third time in four games, knocking off Arizona State in an elimination game.

The hero this time was Ollie Linton, whose bases-loaded single completed their comeback from four runs down in the eighth inning and extended their first appearance in the CWS.

So after beating Texas in the regionals, Wichita State in the super regionals and neighborhood rival Cal State Fullerton and then Arizona State in the CWS, the Anteaters take aim at defending champion Oregon State.

The Anteaters (47-16-1) must beat the Beavers today and again tomorrow to win their bracket and reach the best-of-three championship round.

"The 2007 UC Irvine Anteaters don’t want to take their uniforms off," Coach Dave Serrano said. "It’s going to take someone to do something special to eliminate us from this. We’ve had seven victories in the postseason, and each one has gotten better."

UC Irvine became the first team in the CWS’ 61-year history to win extra-inning games on consecutive days. They beat Cal State Fullerton 5-4 in 13 innings Monday in a 5-hour, 40-minute game, the longest in CWS history.

"I said yesterday was one of the best games I’ve ever been a part of, not realizing today would top that," Serrano said.

Matt Morris singled, Bryan Petersen was intentionally walked and Sean Madigan singled to load the bases with one out in the 10th against ASU reliever Mike Leake.

The pro-Irvine crowd began chanting, "Let’s Go Eaters," as Linton walked to the plate. He sent Leake’s 2-2 pitch into right field to break the 7-7 tie then was mobbed by teammates near first base.