Transcript: Nick Mingione discusses series win over No. 2 Tennessee
Kentucky's ninth-year head coach discussed the Wildcats' series win over No. 2 Tennessee with Bat Cats Central.
Following an 8-2 loss to No. 2 Tennessee on Friday night in Knoxville, Kentucky rallied on consecutive days to knock off the Volunteers and earn their best series victory of the season. With the win, Kentucky is now 22-15 overall and 8-10 in the Southeastern Conference.
After the victory, head coach Nick Mingione discussed some of the highlights of the series with Bat Cats Central. The transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.
On winning the rubber match over Tennessee: “It felt awesome… Couldn’t be more of the guys because we continue to fight. They have real toughness and real belief, and there’s no way you can beat (Tennessee) on the road in their place two days in a row without having that, so I’m proud of the guys.”
On pitcher Nic McCay’s performance on Saturday night: “Coach (Dan) Roszel says all the time that pitchers need to be the tip of the spear, and that they need to be the toughest players on the field. I really believe that Nic McCay showed unbelievable toughness. He did it through his performance. He made pitch after pitch after pitch. He did it with his actions. He did it coming off the field. He did it in the dugout. He gave our team a lift and a level of confidence and toughness that we needed. That’s what it was going to take to win that game.
“We just fed off of that today. When you think about what he did, he did it through his performance, he did it in his actions after, he did it coming off the field, in the dugout. It was impressive. One of the few times in my career where the positional players are telling the pitcher ‘dude, I was feeling you.’ Normally it’s ‘hey, position players, get in his ear.’ And it’s happened before. But he was awesome. He lifted our entire team.”
On Ben Cleaver following up McCay’s performance: “He just picked up right where Nic left off. It went Nic last night and (Jackson) Nove. Nove was awesome, showed real toughness. And it just carried over to Ben. Ben has done this for us week in and week out. Ben is an amazing competitor. Not only is he an amazing competitor, he has amazing stuff. He was able to throw his curveball, land his fastball, changeup. This guy was in control. Our team loves playing behind Ben Cleaver. They feed off of him. He was magnificent.”
On the overall positional player depth over the weekend: ”We used 13 guys. What was neat is the guys who came off the bench, the game found them immediately. Griffin Cameron in center field, (Shaun) Montoya in right, James (McCoy) at first, those guys, the game found them. I was super proud of the job they did defensively and offensively. It was an absolute team effort. I thought our dugout, if you were there, you could feel and sense the vibe. They were feeling it, and they had an unbelievable desire to win that dominates.
“I thought the job that Robert Hogan did Friday night… Hogie finished the game for us, and that allowed us to save our bullpen. We used just Nove yesterday and then Simon today, so our starters going deep were so crucial. But the job that Hogan did to allow us just to use three guys on Friday was awesome. Evan (Byers) was such a short stint, so he was available Saturday and Sunday. But Hogan did a good job finishing that game for us on Friday to put us in a position to win the series.”
On freshman RHP Nate Harris: “I told the team after the Friday game, it’s three pitches or three plays. If I would’ve put one of our defenders in the right spot, that would’ve saved us two runs in the first. If we make a better pitch with those guys on, we don’t give up the three-run home run. And on top of that we had the bases loaded and one out and we had a chance to deliver the blow and take the lead and we didn’t. It’s three pitches, three plays that changed the entire game. We were in that game. We didn’t execute and didn’t do it, but it wasn’t that it was a huge blowout. We were in that game and it came down to a few plays. I explained that to the team. It was that close. This is not a deal where we’re way off.”
Additional comments: “I just thought the job that Coach Roszel, he called unbelievable games. And our pitchers executed at a super high level. I thought the job that we did with our running game, Coach (Chase) Slone and Coach (Austin Cousino) Couzi. And I loved what we got out of Ryan Schwartz. When you think about the impact that he had. I mean, he was competitive, made the plays in the field, brought a good edge to him, I thought it was great. I was super happy to see him do so well. He’s earned it. He was ready for his moment, and that’s one of the greatest compliments you can give somebody, that when you call on them, they’re ready for their moment and not only are they ready for it, they execute it. I thought he was fantastic.”