No. 14 national seed Tennessee (44-16) opened NCAA Tournament play on Friday. The Vols were victorious against No. 4 Knoxville Regional seed Miami University (35-22), 9-2, at Lindsey Nelson Stadium.
5,969 were in attendance.
Tennessee will next play Saturday in a winner’s bracket game against No. 3 regional seed Cincinnati (33-24). The Bearcats defeated Wake Forest, 11-6, in Friday’s other regional contest in Knoxville.
Following Friday’s win over Miami, eighth-year Tennessee head coach Tony Vitello recapped the Vols’ opening contest in the 2025 NCAA Tournament.
“I don’t have much of anything crazy to say, other than we watched some video on these guys, it’s very apparent they play the game the right way,” Vitello said. “They play hard. There’s a reason why they were able to win the (MAC) tournament. They kind of made it look easy, so iit was a very competitive game, especially early on. I thought both of our lefties (Liam Doyle and Andrew Behnke), did an outstanding job. I know we mixed in (Austin) Breedlove in there, he did exactly what we asked him to do. Behnke was very similar to what he was last year in our regional to help kind of finish off the game for us.
“Then both teams can say this. I thought our guys took a lot of good swings where we didn’t necessarily get a great result, so that’s an approach we’d like to keep, and I’m sure Miami of Ohio is saying the same thing, because they barreled up some balls they didn’t get anything on either. Great environment, as well. First game was very competitive. It was loud, at least in the office, and then the crowd doubled in size and probably doubled in noise too.”
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This article originally appeared on Vols Wire: Tennessee head coach Tony Vitello discusses win over Miami baseball