Pitching a persistent problem for Texas baseball team in ’embarrassing’ loss to UTRGV

To open his postgame press conference on Tuesday night, Texas coach David Pierce got right to the point.

“At the end of the day, we’re not a very good baseball team at times. Then there’s times where we look like we’re really good. We’re from one spectrum to the other and tonight was just embarrassing,” Pierce said.

Texas issued 20 free passes to UTRGV in a 17-9 loss at UFCU Disch-Falk Field. Texas walked 11 batters and the Vaqueros were hit by nine Texas pitches. The UTRGV offense also produced 11 hits, two of which were solo homers by Martin Vazquez.

The 17 runs were the most allowed by Texas since a 31-12 loss at Missouri in 2008. Before Tuesday, UT’s season-high totals for walks was eight. The Longhorns hadn’t hit more than four opponents in a single game in 2024.

In a game that lasted four hours and five minutes, Texas could not solve its pitching problems. One of the 10 pitchers who threw on Tuesday was sophomore Jared Thomas, who is normally UT’s starting first baseman. Texas failed to retire UTRGV in order in any of Tuesday’s nine innings.

“I think we have a huge gap in our mentality,” Pierce said. “We have some guys in our clubhouse that are tough as nails and then we have some guys that are just trying to fit in and trying to figure out in the middle of competition if they’re good enough and they’re just not very confident.

“We’re not even talking about Power Five (competition), we’re talking about college baseball, of not being able to throw strikes. At the end of the day, it’s on me. We’ve got to figure this out because it’s going to be a long rest of the season if we don’t.”

Now 22-16 this season, Texas’ RPI of 67 won’t be helped by Tuesday’s result. Entering Tuesday, UTRGV (18-15) had the No. 250 RPI and that baseball program hadn’t won in Austin since 1968.

The Longhorns will host TCU this weekend in a series featuring the Big 12’s fourth- and 11th-place teams. TCU and Texas were ranked first and second in the conference’s preseason poll.