North Carolina fell against Tennessee in the winner’s bracket of their side of the College World Series, and will now face Florida State in an elimination game for the right to beat the Volunteers again.
Morale was certainly lower after the loss compared to the big walk-off win vs. Virginia, but the UNC leaders aren’t hanging their heads and are ready to bounce back.
“I’m not going to let this loss ruin any my experiences here,” said Parks Harber at the postgame press conference. “I’ll be so grateful that I have another opportunity to go out there and play and just leave it all out there and be ready to go.”
A competitor at heart, Harber is already amped up to get another opportunity to play in the College World Series vs. the Seminoles.
“Personally for me, I’m really excited. Really, really excited to get out there for another opportunity on Tuesday. This is the most fun I’ve ever had playing baseball.”
The other senior leader, Vance Honeycutt, was in full concernment with his teammate on those statements: “I couldn’t have said it any better. So I just kind of let it go.”
Next, a sequence from the sixth inning of the Tennessee game was brought up. Vance Honeycutt did hit a home run to open the inning, cutting it to a 4-1 deficit. That generated some energy for the Tar Heels as Casey Cook and Parks Harber got base hits afterward. However, Kirby O’Connell came out of the dugout and immediately got them out of the jam with the three outs, including Tar Heel Anthony Donofrio to end the inning.
I think that was, you know, a big spot for us in the game, but sometimes in baseball, you don’t come through,” Harber reflected. “But I have all the in the world confidence that on Tuesday against Florida State we’ll be in a similar position and he’ll come through,” he added of Donofrio, the player who got out.
Honeycutt once again had very little to add, agreeing with the comments made by Harber.
“He said it all. We have all the confidence in our guys. So just continuing to back them. And like he said, on Tuesday we’ll get it done.”
For UNC, the defeat sets up a conference matchup between them and Florida State in the loser’s bracket. The winner of that game on Tuesday will get the rematch with the top seed and have to win two to get to play for the title.
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