East Carolina, TCU and Arizona beat national seeds on the road in NCAA super regional openers Friday night, and No. 3 Miami joined them in moving within one victory of advancing to the College World Series.
Travis Watkins continued his power surge with a grand slam and two-run homer in East Carolina's 8-6 win over No. 5 Texas Tech in Lubbock, Texas.
Luken Baker hit a three-run homer to lead the Horned Frogs in an 8-2 win over No. 4 Texas A&M in College Station, Texas.
Arizona shut out No. 6 Mississippi State 1-0 in Starkville, Mississippi, with Bobby Dalbec allowing five hits in 8 2/3 innings hours after he was drafted by the Boston Red Sox.
Johnny Ruiz hit two home runs, including a grand slam in the eighth inning, to lead Miami in a 12-7 victory over Boston College in Coral Gables, Florida.
The four other super regionals begin Saturday: Florida State at No. 1 Florida, UC Santa Barbara at No. 2 Louisville, Coastal Carolina at No. 8 LSU and Oklahoma State at South Carolina.
Winners of the best-of-three series advance to the CWS in Omaha, Neb., beginning June 18.
A look around the country:
GAME 1 WINS BIG
Since the current tournament format went into effect in 1999, 77.9 percent (106 of 136) of the teams that won Game 1s in super regionals have advanced to the College World Series.
UNEXPECTED HOMERS
East Carolina's Watkins, who hit three home runs in the regular season, has four in the last three games. In regionals, Watkins' three-run walk-off homer in the ninth inning eliminated defending national champion Virginia, and he hit a two-run homer in the regional final against William & Mary.
Miami's Ruiz, before going deep twice, had hit only two home runs in 151 career games.
BAKER'S ROLL
In his last nine games, TCU's Baker has five homers and 14 RBIs and is batting .611 (22 of 36). Things are going so well for the 6-foot-4, 265-pounder that he was even able to score from second base on a wild pitch in the fifth inning.
DELAYED GRATIFICATION
A power outage caused a 37-minute delay in the middle of the eighth inning between Arizona and Mississippi State. Dalbec went back out to the mound for the bottom of the eighth and faced eight more batters before Cameron Ming relieved with runners on first and second and two outs in the bottom of the ninth. Ming struck out Jake Mangum to end the game.
Dalbec, taken in the fourth round by the Red Sox, was the Wildcats' closer early in the season and was making only his fifth start of the season. He struck out nine, walked two and hit three batters in his longest outing of the season.
DOUBLE OUCH
Mississippi State's Ryan Gridley was hit by Dalbec pitches in his first two plate appearances. The second one, in the fourth inning, ricocheted off Gridley's left elbow pad and struck catcher Cesar Salazar's neck. Salazar was able to keep playing. Gridley has been hit by a team-high 11 pitches.
PROSPECT WATCH
— Miami's Zack Collins, the 10th overall pick by the Chicago White Sox, hit a three-run homer off fellow first-rounder Justin Dunn of Boston College in the third inning of their game in Coral Gables, Florida.
— Dunn, 19th overall pick by New York Mets, gave up two home runs in the third inning, to Collins and Ruiz. They were only the second and third home runs against Dunn this season. He went 5 1/3 innings, giving up five runs on six hits. He walked two and struck out six.
— Mississippi State's Dakota Hudson, 34th overall pick by St. Louis, went 6 1/3 innings against Arizona. He gave up one run on seven hits and a walk and struck out six.
