Jim Schlossnagle on making national championship game: 'Just incredibly proud'

The Texas A&M Aggies are on their way to the College World Series championship series against SEC foe Tennessee. That matchup comes after an impressive shutout victory over another league foe, the Florida Gators, on Wednesday night. Following the win, Aggies head coach Jim Schlossnagle shared his thoughts on playing for the national championship.

“Yeah, I mean, I’m a college baseball fan too,” started Schlossnagle. “I’m tired of leaving before the championship. So personally, it’s awesome, it’s fun to get to be a part of, excited to play an awesome Tennessee team, one of the best college teams that I’ve — I mean, they really have a great team. Not just great players, but they have a great team.”

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For much of the 2024 season, Tennessee and Texas A&M have been near the top of the college baseball rankings. However, the Volunteers slightly outperformed the Aggies this year. They finish the regular season as co-SEC champs, along with Kentucky, another program that was in Omaha this year. Tennessee is also the winner of this year’s SEC tournament.

While Schlossnagle was jubilant about making it to the championship series, he was also quick to praise Florida’s head coach, Kevin O’Sullivan, for the impressive job he did this season.

“I want to make sure — Florida, what Sully did with his club, coming from 13-17 to play in the Final Four in the country, just — Florida is the program that at Texas A&M we’re trying to emulate,” said Schlossnagle. “State school that continues just to build really good high school players on top of high school players and cherry-pick the portal and not have to rely on the transfer portal so much. Florida, to me, is the epitome of what every program should look to be. It doesn’t shock me. Death, taxes, and Florida in Omaha is pretty much things you can count on.

“But, yeah, we’re excited. I’m excited for the 12th man. Texas A&M has an awesome fan base, and just incredibly proud and awesome people that you just — you want to reward the commitment that they have made. I think we’ve done that. Obviously, we’d like to win the whole thing, but it’s been a good year to this point.”

In terms of record, Florida was the Cinderella team of this year’s College World Series. However, the Gators are a true college baseball power and were ranked as such heading into the season. Still, despite their slow start to 2024, Florida was able to bounce back down the stretch and pull off upset victories in the Regional and Super Regional rounds of the tournament.

Schlossnagle and the Aggies head into the College World Series finale undefeated in the postseason. That is good news for Texas A&M, which is on a quest to capture the program’s first national championship. Four of the last five teams to enter the championship series undefeated in postseason play went on to capture the national championship.