Aggies sit at 1-0 after shutting out Grambling on Friday afternoon

Game #58: #1 Texas A&M 8, #4 Grambling State 0
Records: Texas A&M (45-13, 19-11), Grambling State (26-27, 18-8)
WP: Brad Rudis (6-0)
LP: Mason Martinez (12-3)
Box Score

As they should.

In Game 1 of the 2024 Bryan-College Station Regional on Friday afternoon, No. 3 national seed Texas A&M did what the Aggies should in shutting out Grambling State, 8-0.

With the Friday win, A&M moves to Saturday’s winners' bracket game against either Louisiana or Texas at 8 p.m.

"Good ballgame. It unfolded about like I thought," said A&M head coach Jim Schlossnagle. "All in all, a good day. Weather cleared up, had a good crowd, so excited to move on."

For the most part, the Aggies did what they should.

They got timely hitting.

They got solid pitching.

They even played good defense — the lone miscue was a Weston Moss throwing error on a pick-off attempt.

"We talked to the team all week about in this particular game, you have to check your ego at the door," Schlossnagle said. "You have to be disciplined.

"We had a few unfortunate things that kept us from breaking the game open, but I thought we created pressure the whole game."

Shockingly, the long ball did not factor into A&M's Tiger takedown.

Instead of running balls out of Blue Bell Park, the Aggies ran at will, stealing six bases on the afternoon.

A&M used a big seven-run second to run away.

"When you look at the game, if you take away the bottom of the second inning, it's a different ballgame," said Grambling head coach Davin Pierre. "It's the thing that we were trying to avoid... The thing for us was to try to avoid the big inning, and if we could keep them from a five-run, six-run, seven-run inning, we felt really good about our chances."

In that stanza, the bottom five in the Aggie order all reached to open the frame.

They each scored as Ali Camarillo, Jace LaViolette and Braden Montgomery each picked up an RBI, with Grambling starter Mason Martinez allowing two more runs to come home on back-to-back wild pitches.

Ted Burton rounded out the second with a two-run single that built the A&M lead to 7-0.

The Michigan transfer finished 3-for-5 with a double and three RBIs as Montgomery joined him with a three-hit day.

"The approach was that we wanted to land a lot of jabs instead of a haymaker punch," Burton explained. "We did a great job of that."

After the second, the Aggies ran and hid.

A&M's only other marker came on Burton's fourth-inning single that plated Gavin Grahovac.

Kelii Horvath, TexAgs

Ted Burton finished 3-for-4 and drove in three runs to pace the Aggie offense.

The eight runs held up despite Grambling threatening in almost every inning.

Indeed, the Tigers left a whopping 14 on and had at least one man aboard in each frame until the ninth.

A&M received a serviceable 3.1-inning start from Tanner Jones.

Brad Rudis and Moss were sterling in respective five-out outings.

Even little-used reliever Eldridge Armstrong III offered 2.1 innings of scoreless ball.

"The mindset is always the same, no matter the score, whether there's runners on base or whatever it may be," Rudis said. "Just hammer the zone and let the defense work behind me. That's about it."

A&M’s big bullpen arms were saved, and the offense showed life, even without the biggest of swings.

And in the end, the Aggies did what needed to.

"I feel pretty good," Schlossnagle said of his pitching staff. "We won a regional game and didn't have to pitch (Ryan) Prager, (Shane) Sdao, (Justin) Lamkin, (Evan) Aschenbeck, (Chris) Cortez. I didn't want to use Brad today, but 18 pitches, he's fine. It's a little tune-up for him.

"It kind of went about almost perfect."

As a result, the Aggies will be watching intently as Louisiana and Texas battle on Friday evening.

As they should.