Texas continues its run as No. 1, sweeps Texas A&M in thrilling Sunday affair

After a weekend filled with dominant pitching and narrow wins, Texas and Texas A&M remained within 1–2 runs for the entirety of Sunday’s game.

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The difference this time, however, was that Texas’ victory came not from the stellar outings of its star pitching staff but from offensive explosions by Adrian Rodriguez and Rylan Galvan, who were the difference-makers for the Longhorns in a 6–5 win over Texas A&M. Brooms were brought to the park, and they got their fair share of usage from the Longhorn faithful. Texas took all three games against its biggest baseball rivals.

It felt like this series had been on everyone’s bulletin boards since the moment Jim Schlossnagle donned burnt orange for the first time, and yet, it mostly seemed like another regular weekend for Texas baseball.

Sure, IT was near the locker room area after last night’s win, and one could hear deep-voiced “let’s go’s” and some other words not fit for print. But despite the series sweep of the Longhorns’ rival, Texas really just continued doing what it has done all year.

This weekend saw the five teams ranked between No. 1 Texas and No. 7 LSU lose their series. While the rest of the top teams in the nation battled out tough series and saw some disappointing results, Texas has just kept winning. Its 19–2 start to the SEC season is the best ever.

That’s not to say this weekend wasn’t a heart-racing 27 innings of baseball. A&M led in six of those innings, and even today’s game felt like the Aggies had the upper hand, but the winning recipe for Texas kept coming back: clutch pitching and high-level defense making up for the lack of explosive hitting.

In all three games this week, Texas called on the bullpen to shut the door at the end of the game, and every time, they delivered. Dylan Volantis, Max Grubbs, and Thomas Burns gave up one earned run in the final three innings of the Friday and Saturday games. Today, Grubbs was joined by Ethan Walker and Grayson Saunier to finish a game that Andre Duplantier had to pitch 5 2/3 innings of out of the bullpen. They gave up zero runs.

A&M entered the weekend having scored eight or more runs in nine of its last 11 games. They scored eight runs combined this series, half of which came in the first four innings of today’s matchup. And when the Aggies were finally able to put some pressure on Texas, Rodriguez responded with three hits, three runs, and two RBIs, most notably on a go-ahead opposite-field home run in the bottom of the eighth.

There’s so much to be said about this Texas team as it continues an almost improbable run as the No. 1 team in the land. Texas didn’t even have its best hitter or Friday starter. The Disch was alive—the best this year—and it had a record attendance count throughout the weekend. The players have embraced that energy the fans bring, and every hit feels like it’s for the thousands of fans Skol-ing and throwing their horns high and proud.

Texas is now 37–5, 19–2 in the SEC, and there’s no better team in college baseball; it’s not even close. The Longhorns have already likely clinched a national seed, and they’re starting to get comfortable as the No. 1 team in these weekly rankings.

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The Longhorns will host Prairie View A&M on Tuesday before heading out to Fayetteville for a tough road trip against Arkansas, which just dropped a series to Florida. Still, it’s one of the ten best teams in the sport, and Texas hasn’t faced a team of its level on the road. Texas has nothing more left to prove, but it might feel nice to shut up some of the doubters and win a top-tier road series.