TCU baseball pulls away from McNeese State behind Austin Krob’s pitching gem
TCU left-hander Austin Krob had to handle his emotions. That’s the message his coach and catcher both delivered going into the Fort Worth Regional on Friday night.
Message received.
Krob overcame a rough first inning and turned in a 13-strikeout gem, carrying the Frogs to a 12-4 victory over McNeese State at Lupton Stadium.
“Today I had a slogan: Move on,” Krob said. “My pre-pitch routine was to focus on this pitch, win this pitch. Just having that confidence in myself. That’s the reason I had that outing today.”
The “move on” slogan was tested early. McNeese scored two runs in the first inning off Krob, although there weren’t many hard-hit balls.
Still, earlier in the season, that sort of inning might have rattled Krob.
“If that’d been two weeks ago, he’d be pounding his glove and out of control and screaming at somebody,” TCU coach Jim Schlossnagle said.
Instead, Schlossnagle gave Krob a little pep talk in the dugout and Krob responded by throwing seven scoreless innings. He retired 12 of 13 batters at one point. Krob finished the night going eight-plus innings, allowing four runs on seven hits with two walks and 13 strikeouts.
“You’re watching the maturation of a pitcher,” Schlossnagle said. “Hopefully he’ll get to pitch again this year.”
Krob put TCU in position to make it out of the Fort Worth Regional with his effort Friday.
TCU (41-17) advances to face Dallas Baptist (38-15) at 6 p.m. Saturday. Dallas Baptist defeated Oregon State 6-5 on Friday afternoon. Oregon State (34-23) and McNeese State (32-29) will meet in an elimination game at noon Saturday.
Sophomore left-hander Russell Smith is expected to start for TCU.
Krob was given the opportunity to go the distance, but gave up consecutive hits in starting the ninth inning. Frogs junior right-hander Harrison Beethe closed the game.
As well as Krob pitched, though, it seemed like his outing may be wasted. TCU’s offense didn’t get much going the first six innings other than a two-out solo home run by Brayden Taylor in the first inning.
The Frogs left eight runners on base in the first six innings. Cowboys senior left-hander Jonathan Ellison allowed just Taylor’s home run over 4 2/3 innings, and then Brad Kincaid pitched a scoreless inning of relief.
The Frogs had multiple scoring opportunities such as in the third inning. TCU had two runners on with one out, but Hunter Wolfe bounced into an inning-ending 6-4-3 double play. On that play, McNeese’s shortstop Reid Bourque couldn’t field the ball cleanly but it rolled off his glove directly to second base to start the double play.
TCU had another opportunity in the sixth inning when Phillip Sikes reached with a one-out double and Luke Boyers drew a two-out walk. But McNeese turned to hard-throwing reliever Cameron Foster, who got Tommy Sacco to pop up on a 2-0 fastball.
The Frogs’ offense finally broke loose in the seventh inning against Foster. Porter Brown led off with a single followed by four-pitch walks drawn by Zach Humphreys and Taylor.
Wolfe provided the go-ahead hit with a two-run single through the left side. Gray Rodgers came through with a two-run single, and Boyers delivered the knockout blow with a two-run homer over the right-field fence. It was Boyers’ first career home run.
“There’s no place else I would rather hit my first home run than at home, especially in a Regional,” said Boyers, who took advantage of a high inside fastball. “The crowd made me feel so good. That’s a moment I’ll remember forever.”
TCU cushioned its lead with five more runs in the eighth, highlighted by two-run hits by Sikes and Sacco and a one-run double by Elijah Nunez.
Boyers said the offense had a feeling the floodgates would eventually open if they kept getting runners on base.
“It was just a matter of time,” Boyers said. “We try to focus on having good at-bats. We were getting people on, we just needed to capitalize on it.”
The Frogs improved to 21-3 in NCAA Regional games played at Lupton Stadium. Now it’s on to DBU. TCU and DBU have faced each other twice before in a NCAA Regional. DBU won in 2011, TCU won in 2017.
Asked about DBU, Schlossnagle said: “That’s an Omaha program that hasn’t broken through yet.”
Schlossnagle paused, smiled and added: “I hope they wait until 2022 to do it.”
This story was originally published June 4, 2021 at 9:34 PM.
