Postgame Quotes
4/21/2007 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
April 21, 2007
Head Coach Steve Smith:
On Willie Kempf's performance:
"What Willie did should be tremendously encouraging to Kendal (Volz). Up until then, if I'm Kendal, I've got to wonder if I've got a chance. Willie showed that you've got a chance. They're human beings, and they're good hitters; they hit mistakes, but if you pitch well you can get some guys out. That's really encouraging for all of us, not just for Kendal."
On how the team competed:
"It was a great offensive day. I was really proud of the way we competed. I had thoughts of getting Willie out of there after a couple of innings just so that I wouldn't burn him up with us being seven runs down, but our guys were competing so hard that I really thought we had a chance to come back and win the game. I just didn't want to give them another run, and he was doing so well, so we just rolled the dice. We had (Nick) Cassavechia ready to come in during the eighth inning if necessary, but Willie didn't crack."
On Dustin Dickerson being thrown out trying to stretch a single in the seventh:
"That's an aggressive play right there, and it's close. What I'd like to see him do different and he's got to improve on is his sliding because he slows down to slide. I wouldn't necessarily call that play an error. It was kind of a soft line drive that got kicked away, and if he's running harder out of the box and he's head first into second base, he's got a chance to get there. When we're down like that you want to get to scoring position if you can. It was a tough play, but that one I can live with."
Baylor senior catcher Matt Czimsky:
On losing despite scoring 11 runs:
"Most of the time when you get that many hits and score that many runs, you're going to win. But we just couldn't avoid that big inning that hurt us."
On his hitting:
"I've been hitting the ball hard for a while now and it's just good to be out there and playing."
On throwing out two baserunners:
"I got a couple of good pitches to thrown on; that always helps out a lot."
On how the team competed:
"Nobody on the team ever backed down. We played hard the whole nine innings, and that's all you can ask."
On how the team can rebound from losing two straight:
"We've got to try not to get swept. That's what's been hurting us this whole year is those two sweeps, so we've got to try to win one tomorrow and take it from there."
Baylor freshman relief pitcher Willie Kempf:
On his performance:
"I felt good tonight. I had all of my pitches going. My job was to come in and try to keep us close so we can get back in the game. I made some pitches, things went my way and I put up a few zeros. Unfortunately we didn't quite get back in it enough to get the win. That's what really mattered."
On facing a hot-hitting team like Missouri:
"I'm going to throw my best stuff and if they can hit it then I guess they're just better hitters than I am a pitcher. So there's nothing I can really do except throw my best stuff every time. Obviously going in with the bases loaded got my heart pumping a little bit."
On the significance of tomorrow's game:
"Huge game tomorrow. We need to come out and salvage (that game). We're going to be border-line as it is, so we've got to start winning. That's all there is to it; we've got to get wins. I'm not saying we can't lose, but we can't lose two out of three too many more times."
On how disappointing it is to lose despite scoring 11 runs:
"It's very disappointing. We couldn't get the pitching to match up with the offense today. You take out that one nine-run inning ... if we don't lay that egg the game's not even close."
