Rocking The Light Late Into The Night

The University of Arizona, fresh off their opening game victory over the University of Miami and feeling all confident, made the mistake of coming back to the Hurricanes' house for game two of the Super Regional on Saturday night.  Well, you just don't come into the 305 and especially Mark Light Stadium and expect to get a way without a serious beating being dealt out to your team (literally) and sometimes their fans (figuratively).

The Hurricanes appeared to have reformed over the warm, open waters of nearby Biscayne Bay and came ashore once again, storming back from their opening game loss to pound and pound and pound the stubborn and scrappy Wildcats into submission 14-10.  Forecasters had predicted an active and dangerous 2008 Hurricane season and the fans in South Florida were there to witness the damage.

Canes RB Javaris James scored from 5 yards out in the first quarter and QB Robert Marve connected with the Canes leading receiver in 2008 Aldarius Johnson for a 27 yard score on the second half to propel the Canes.  The Wildcats could manage only a 33 yard FG in the first half before adding a late and meaningless TD with only 14 seconds to go in the game against the Canes third string defense.  Coach Randy Shannon said after the game that...oops, that's looking ahead just a little too far for many Canes fans who may not be fans of the hardballers and yet are desperate for football season to start.

In reality, Jim Morris and his merry band of ball mashers belted out four (count 'em four) home runs in a brutal exhibition of long ball.  The Canes battery officially broke out their slump and proceeded to pound to ball into the gap and over the stadium outfield fence. While Weeks and Raben (who set a NCAA record for walks in one game at six) were walking their way on base,  Alonso, Grandal and Sobolewski were happy enough to rip the cover off the ball and what was left of it over the fence for some serious run producing at bats. 

The Light was absolutely LIT UP not only by the efforts of the Canes players but by the festivities of the Canes fans on hand to witness a party like no other this year in Coral Gables. The fans who showed up to witness the destruction of the Wildcats were led by the Canespacers in the stands in chanting:

"Let's Go Cane", C-A-N-E-S...CANES", "It's Great, to be, a Miami Hurricane", Got Some Canes Over Here, Whoosh, Whoosh and the ever present RAG ARM by some guy wearing an orange Canespace T-shirt.  We never found out who this fan was, except that his first name was "Greg" and he was seen sitting next to 86Cane on several occasions.  Hmmmm... 

The Canes face the same Wildcat team tonight at 7 PM on the duece (ESPN2) for a trip to the CWS in Omaha.  We will be blogging the game LIVE so join us.  This party is BYOB: Bring Your Own Blogging! 

Comments

[pb(CSHOF09)]

Great game. Go Canes!

[Hurricane Mitch]

People can stay with me. I'm about 10 minutes south of Rosenblatt. 86, I'm working on tickets and passes. Can't give you a guarantee, but I'll see what I can do.

[Cat5 Cane]

Go Canes.... later all

[MattInNY]

Hotels I can get. I am Platinum at Marriott and I have a guarantee for any hotel. Basicly they boot people out of their reservation if I want a room.

[SOUP]

MITCH...LET ME KNOW ASAP!

[AvaCane96]

can someone here explain how the CWS works?? is it a bunch of 3 game series?? or single game elimination?? or what??

[NavyCane4Life]

Double Elimination, except for the Championship Series

[NavyCane4Life]

Championship Series is best of 3

[AvaCane96]

k thanks Minn

[MattinNY]

Ava...there are 2 brackets and its double elimination, juet like regional play. The 2 teams that come out of each bracket than play a 3 game series to determine the champion, just like super regional play.

[AvaCane96]

thanks guys

GO CANES

[Alex D]

Maybe this is a sign of good things to come for the football team this fall. First, you have the basketball team making the NCAA post-season tournament and now the baseball team is going to the college world series. Way to go Canes!

[Jer]

Oh man, ok I just got done dancing around. Go Canes!!! Can't wait for Georgia! My neighbors are going to be soooo unhappy with Miami!

[NavyCane4Life]

I remember watching Miami win the 1999 and 2001 Championships in Omaha, but I can't make it to Omaha this year. Went last year hoping they would make it, but they didnt, so I cheered for NC because of the ACC connection. The CWS is a great venue and wesome environment. GO CANES!

[SOUP]

Mithc ...I was just messing with U. I can NOT make it to Omaha.

But Other 'Spacers like MattinNY and JC and others may want to go.

CONTACT Mitch if U want to go...

[Montreal-Cane]

Here is a good link for hotels in Omaha

http://travel.yahoo.com/p-hotel-191501965-omaha_hotels-i

[MattinNY]

I do have to say we might have had one of the toughest regionals and super regionals but we are definitely on the easier side of the 2 brackets in Omaha. Look at the other side of the bracket...UNC, Rice, Arizona St. (They will take care of Fresno tonight) and either LSU or UC Irvine.

Our side is us, Georgia, FSU and Stanford.

[Jer]

So your saying that FSU is our only comp Matt?

[MattinNY]

Thats what I am saying. Georgia has been inconsistant as of late and I just think Stanford is weak too. It will be us and FSU to come out of the bracket.

On the other side who the heck knows, those are some stacked teams over there and they are all very good. Arizona St., UNC and Rice are all top 5 teams.

[Jer]

Yeah, that's the way they've been playing lately.

[OCALACANE]

Lizard Land in the House!!!
I still can' talk If I could I would Yell!!!
C
A
N
E
S
CANES!!!
305 BALLERZ!!!

[MattinNY]

It is Jer. Take a look bro and you will see a 7-6 record their last 13 games. Inconsistant.

[OCALACANE]

I also want to give a shout or SHHHH to the Arizona Wildcats great series!!!
A worthy opponent!!

[OCALACANE]

86... U on?

[AvaCane96]

i wonder where that "Zona owns the Canes" guy went off to??

[Jer]

i wonder where that "Zona owns the Canes" guy went off to??

Posted by: AvaCane96 | June 08, 2008 at 11:15 PM

Even though we beat them I'll give some respect to Zona and that blogger he had some respect and I will respect his team and him. They had some great pitching and I'm even more proud that we had to go threw them to the CWS. Props Zona.

[Jer]

No matter what though....

C
A
N
E
S
Canes!!!!!!

[Jer]

Watching the NBA game now and I'm sure
Darc is happy at this point.

[TLuv]

congrats to the baseball team. I wish I could make it to Omaha. GO CANES!

[Jer]

I'm working on getting off work right now. Hopefully I can make some of it.

[canesfan2121]

BREAKING NEWS: ROBERT MARVE WAS SITTING IN THE RIGHT FIELD BULLPEN SEATS. HE WAS TALKING SH#T TO THE NUMBER 4 GUY THAT TOLD THE CROWD TO SHUT UP IN THE 1ST GAME. I LOVE THIS GUY!

[Montreal-Cane]

Even though we beat them I'll give some respect to Zona and that blogger he had some respect and I will respect his team and him. They had some great pitching and I'm even more proud that we had to go threw them to the CWS. Props Zona.

Posted by: Jer | June 08, 2008 at 11:20 PM

I totally agree with Jer!

[Jer]

Thank you Montreal. We are the best and I have faith in Haith.... No I have faith in Morris. He knows what to do and he is the king when it comes to this part of the season. Go U!

[Jer]

I can't wait to represent the U to my friends, family and fellow employees. Go Canes!

[Montreal-Cane]

UM will face No. 8 seed Georgia on Saturday to start its College World Series action.

The College World Series runs from June 14-25.

[SJMPARMAN]

Way to go Canes! Great pitching, solid defense, jumped on them early, everything we needed to do. That was a very entertaining series. I want to second the kudos to the Arizona team. Those guys were a very good team. If they had faced any other team, they would be in the CWS. We just were the better team overall. We did such a great job keeping runners from scoring tonight.

I am headed to Phoenix tomorrow and will wear my Canes stuff proudly all week. I won't be popular but I am proud!

[Jer]

Props SJMPARMAN!!!

[pb(CSHOF09)]

Zona was really tough.

[Jer]

Definitely PB. I'm happy we got past them.

[Montreal-Cane]

Fresno State 7 Arizona State 5 in the 5th...

[Jer]

Watching that game. Wow I like their stadium. Hope the Light is remade like it.

[Loco]

Great game last night, was in the keys so i didn't get to watch it, but had a friend updating me... I'm pretty sure all of key largo heard that we won lol

Great game tonight too, got back too late to get tix but watched it on ESPN 2, it was amazing. On to Omaha!

Now everyone will see that the ACC (us) is better than the SEC (Georgia)

[Carlos]

what's up everyone....

- Good to finally meet 86 & his brother, Ocala, Cat5, Ricky and to see Ronald, Keoki, & Ronald again. Let me know when the next get together is and I'm there. 1st round is on me and you can vault it. :)

- Best moment of the night: Seeing that french fairy Gaston weeping after his team lost. SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! LOL

- If anyone sees those Zona trolls who were here after game 1, be sure to make 'em eat some of that tasty crow. mmmmmmMMMMM b1tch!

- Weeks almost booted the game for us with that error to lead off the 9th. imo, He'll follow the same path as Ryan Braun & Pat Burrell and end up in the outfield UNLESS he gets a good infield coach to help polish his D. He has soft hands and a quick release on a D.P. but his problem is he tends to sit on his heels waiting for the ball to play him. In the show, if you can get a guy with solid hands to play that position, they'll just move over the error prone guy to the outfield b/c they don't want to lose his bat in the lineup. Weeks has been on fire offensively.

- That was probably the best pitching we'll face all year. That said, we were pretty fortunate not to face Schlereth. But we faced arguably the best bullpen in the nation and got it done. We scored 30 runs vs. UNC and killed their ace.

[Six]

Georgia - 3 times in the past 5 years, they've been in Omaha

- They handled NC State 11-4 and 17-8 in the Super Regional

- Swept Clemson, South Carolina and Kentucky this year

- Lost 2 of 3 to Arizona .. 1-7 and 8-9

- Took 2 of 3 against Ole Miss, but lost to them in the SEC Tournament

- Took 2 of 3 against Vandy

- Took 3 of 4 against Georgia Tech

- Took 2 of 3 against LSU, the 3rd game ended in a tie in 12 innings due to travel curfew

Their main player is obviously Gordon Beckham - the guy went 8th overall in the draft and was the SEC Player of the Year. He's hitting .401 with 101 hits, 26 HR, 72 RBI and 90 runs. His on base percentage is .513.

Their closer Joshua Fields went 20th overall to the Mariners. His ERA is 2.76 in 31 appearances. He has 16 saves in 32 innings pitched, with 59 K's and 20 walks. Opponents are hitting .125 against him.

As of June 8th ..
- UGA has 5 guys hitting over .330
- UGA has 4 guys with over 90 hits
- UGA has almost 5 guys with over 30 walks - the 5th has 29 walks

As of June 3rd, b/c the Miami Sports Info Dept. is slow ..
- The U has 4 guys hitting over .330
- The U has NO ONE with over 90 hits - Sobolewski is the closest with 88 and Yonder is the next closest with 79 ... (Sobolewski went 4-15 in the Super Regional, so that would put him over 90 hits ... Yonder went 3-10 in the Super Regional, so that would put him at 82 hits)
- The U has 3 guys with over 30 walks

So, UGA has some guys that can hit and that also draw walks. If you have over half of your lineup hitting over .330 and four of those guys have over 90 hits for the year ... they're doing something right.

[Montreal-Cane]

Final Fresno State 8 Arizona State 8

Series is tied 1-1

[Montreal-Cane]

Highlights of the game Miami vs Arizona

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/espnu/index

[Rubcatcane]

i wonder where that "Zona owns the Canes" guy went off to??

Posted by: AvaCane96 | June 08, 2008 at 11:15 PM

Nothing like humble pie to throw in their face. Don't know which one is better, Gaston ballin' for loosi'n (payback for the shhhh)

Our coach is a class act all the way and thus our team is also.
But, that Asisona Team was a tough matchup -- even they can't keep the U from their "destiny."

[alf]

http://img357.imageshack.us/img357/8260/shhhhvn5.gif

SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

[CVS]

U > Zona
U > UGA
U > Stanford
U > FSU
U > whoever they put us in the CWS against. It's time to put up, shut up, and win!
Great series Canes!!!! Way to go!

- CVS

[bg1906]

ITU has an article up with the jersey numbers assigned to the freshman, check it out.