Texas 2025 SEC Baseball Tournament Exit Interview

(Yahoo Sports photo)

By Jake Mastroianni

SEC Tournament Results: L, 7-5 (12) vs. Tennessee

Record: 42-12

It was a controversial start to Texas’s move into the SEC, having stolen away head coach Jim Schlossnagle from Texas A&M. But the move certainly paid off as they were the regular season champions, going 22-8 in SEC play.

Pitching led the way for this Longhorns team, leading the SEC with a 3.54 ERA and .216 batting average against. It wasn’t necessarily a dominant pitching staff with a K/9 of 9.39, but they did a great job of limiting walks and keeping the ball in the yard.

For much of the season, the weekend formula of Jared Spencer, Luke Harrison, and Ruger Riojas worked perfectly.

But Spencer left his start against Auburn on April 17th and ended up being ruled out for the rest of the season, as it was determined he would need shoulder surgery.

That didn’t seem to slow them down as they swept Auburn in that series, and then rival Texas A&M the next weekend. But they did lose two of their last three SEC series.

A big part of their pitching success was the bullpen. Freshman Dylan Volantis was the SEC Freshman of the Year after posting a 1.99 ERA and 0.90 WHIP in 45.1 innings with 68 strikeouts and 12 saves.

Max Grubbs was just as dominant out of the pen and able to give them multiple innings.

Offensively, it was more of a struggle for Texas. It doesn’t help that they lost their best hitter in Max Belyeu at the end of March. He did return for the final regular season series, which should be a huge boost for them in the postseason.

Ethan Mendoza became a huge spark plug for them atop the lineup, hitting .330 with 51 runs scored and 12 stolen bases.

Rylan Galvan had several clutch hits throughout the season and led the team with 14 home runs.

What’s next

The Longhorns will be a national seed and get to play at home, which is big for them as their ballpark plays to their strengths in the pitching staff.

While Luke Harrison and Ruger Riojas have been good for Texas, not having that Friday guy in Spencer leaves a big hole. But if they can get it to the bullpen with a lead, you feel great about their chances.

If Belyeu can shake off the rust from all the time he missed, and others like Jalin Flores and Will Gasparino can step up, this offense has enough firepower to win them a game.

Schlossnagle is one of the best coaches in the country and knows what it takes to get to Omaha. Is this the group that finally gets him that elusive title?

Texas head coach Jim Schlossnagle on all of the close games his team has played this year and how that prepares them for the postseason:

Well, certainly, like all the coaches I'm sure have said, when you get through this league and you play through this league, there's nothing that's going to surprise you. We're going to play good teams next week and moving forward if we earn the right to play after next weekend. But there's not going to be any teams that are going to be better. There's not going to be better pitchers. There's no other lefty that I know of that's better than Liam Doyle. So you can work off that. We've played a lot of close games because we do pitch well. We do play solid. Not the most offensive team, but kind of an opportunistic offensive team.

We have to play clean baseball to win because we're not super explosive. We can be with the right guys healthy, if we get Jonah back. Belyeu obviously changes the makeup of our team. But this is a tough team. They win anyway. In Austin, they call it Texas fight and this bunch has that. We've still got to go earn the wins, but it's an honor to be in the dugout with our team.

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