FAYETTEVILLE — Southeast Missouri State Coach Andy Sawyers knocked his mentor, Dave Van Horn, out of the NCAA Baseball Tournament on Sunday.
The Redhawks, champions of the Ohio Valley Conference Tournament and the No. 4 seeds of the Fayetteville Regional, beat the top-seeded University of Arkansas 6-3 at Baum-Walker Stadium before an announced crowd of 10,788 to end the Razorbacks’ season much earlier than expected.
As the No. 5 overall national seed, the Razorbacks were set to host a super regional next week and projected to advance to the College World Series.
Instead, Arkansas (44-16) was eliminated by Southeast Missouri State (36-26) to complete Van Horn’s 22nd season as coach at his alma mater.
It was the first time Arkansas has lost to a No. 4 seed since the NCAA Tournament format changed in 1999.
The Razorbacks went 1-2 in the regional, with a 17-9 victory over Southeast Missouri State on Friday and 7-6 loss to Kansas State on Saturday, after being 33-3 at Baum-Walker Stadium during the regular season.
Arkansas was eliminated at its home regional for the second year in row after losing twice to TCU last season.
Sawyers played catcher for Van Horn at Nebraska in 1998 and was a volunteer assistant for him with the Cornhuskers in 2000. He has credited Van Horn with helping launch his coaching career.
“I told Coach Van Horn, ‘Thank you. Every day I do something that you taught me,’ ” Sawyers said of his postgame talk with Van Horn. “I was a little emotional. I had some tears in my eyes behind the sunglasses because I got to beat my coach today.
“That doesn’t happen very often. That was a pretty cool moment.”
The Redhawks won their second consecutive NCAA Tournament game, along with a 9-3 victory over Louisiana Tech on Saturday, after being 1-10 all-time in the tournament with a 7-4 victory at Alabama in 2002.
Sawyers got his first NCAA Tournament victories in his eighth season at Southeast Missouri State, which he has led to a regional appearance in three of the past four seasons.
“I’ve been proud of Andy ever since he played for me a long time ago,” Van Horn said.
The Redhawks did Sawyers proud Sunday, especially a pitching staff led by starter Collin Wilma that shut down the Razorbacks.
Arkansas trailed 6-1 going into the ninth inning before Parker Rowland hit a pinch-hit, two-run home run to make it 6-3.
Wilma, a fifth-year senior right-hander, worked 4 2/3 innings and held the Razorbacks to 1 run, 1 hit and 2 walks with 6 strikeouts. He estimated about 60% of his 71 pitches were curveballs that registered from 67 to 63 mph on the stadium scoreboard.
“He did a really good job,” Arkansas right fielder Kendall Diggs said. “He flipped that curveball in. Flipped it for a strike. He could bury it.
“It complemented his heater, even the slider really well. So hats off to him.”
Van Horn said usually the slowest curveballs the Razorbacks see are in the low 70s.
“It was a true curveball, the old curveball,” Van Horn said. “You kind of try to sit on that thing a little bit, you try to guess, and then he throws the fastball so you can’t swing.”
Wilma, who allowed 3 runs and 3 hits in 3 innings of relief against Arkansas on Friday, came into Sunday’s game with a 5.60 ERA in 54 2/3 innings this season.
“That’s the absolute best he’s ever thrown,” Sawyers said. “Certainly for a school like SEMO to come to one of the Taj Mahals of college baseball and win a game like that in an elimination setting, it’s going to require some heroics. And I thought Collin’s outing today was heroic.”
Logan Katen, Peyton Lawrence and Kyle Miller — all seniors — also pitched for the Redhawks.
“What a great job by SEMO’s pitchers,” Van Horn said. “They threw four guys at us that really located. They pitched out of a couple of jams.”
Miller got the final two outs and earned his ninth save, but Katen executed arguably the game’s key pitch when he left the bases loaded in the fifth inning by retiring Arkansas designated hitter Hudson White on a ground ball after left fielder Peyton Holt’s home run pulled the Razorbacks within 4-1.
Logan came in for Wilma and started 3-0 against White. The count went to 3-2 with two called strikes, then White grounded out on a 3-2 changeup.
“(Katen) throws one right there for a strike, and then 3-1 (White’s) got the green light to go, and he took it,” Van Horn said. “It was a borderline pitch, but (home plate umpire Matt Anderson) called it a strike.”
Van Horn said Logan threw five consecutive fastballs before the changeup.
“Went to 82 miles per hour from 89,” Van Horn said. “(White) hit it off the end of the bat, and that was the pitch of the game in my opinion.”
The Redhawks increased their lead to 6-1 on Brooks Kettering’s RBI single in the fifth inning and his home run in the seventh.
After a home run by Ty Stauss in the first inning off Arkansas starter Gage Wood gave Southeast Missouri State — the designated home team — a 1-0 lead, the Redhawks added three more runs against Wood and Jake Faherty in the fourth inning, including Brad Palmer’s double and RBI singles by Josh Cameron and Ian Riley.
Arkansas managed 8 base runners on 6 hits and 2 walks, and left 7 runners on base.
In the eight inning, Peyton Stovall hit a leadoff single and went to third on White’s double with Arkansas having its 3-4-5 hitters coming up.
Lawerence came in for Katen and got Jared Sprague-Lott on a groundout, Ben McLaughlin on a popout and Wehiwa Aloy on a groundout to strand the runners.
“That was difficult,” Van Horn said. “But you’ve got to give them credit. They pitched us good. They kept us off balance.”
Arkansas, which had a 27-game home winning streak earlier this season, lost back-to-back games at Baum-Walker Stadium for the only time this season.
“It’s always shocking when you want to go out there and win at home (and lose),” Stovall said. “We were fighting and wanted to keep playing as long as we could.”
Sawyers said he believed it’s a coincidence the Razorbacks lost twice at home in the regional after their dominant regular season.
“I think they’re a fantastic club,” Sawyers said. “It’s tough for them and their kids to have such a great year and finish it the way they did.”
Sawyers said that before the game he was talking to Southeast Missouri State hitting coach Trevor Ezell, who is from Bryant and played for the Razorbacks after beginning his career with the Redhawks.
“Coach Ezell, who obviously wore this uniform here says, ‘If we win this game, I’m going to feel bad for those kids, because of how good they have played this year,’ ” Sawyers said. “I looked at him and he said, ‘But we’re still going to win the game.’ And I said, ‘Yeah we are, Trevor.’
“But certainly, you feel for those guys. I can’t explain why they lost two in a row at home.”
Diggs struggled with the question as well.
“Yeah man, it sucks,” Diggs said. “We gave it all we had. But congrats to SEMO. They played a good game.”
