Tennessee baseball needed a test like the one it passed against Campbell | Estes

You won’t often learn something new about a college baseball team in game No. 62.

By then, there are few surprises. You are who you are, no matter how fortune ends up treating you in some absurdly high-scoring, incredibly competitive NCAA regional game.

But what if you’ve hardly dealt with any competition at all?

This is Tennessee baseball in 2022 we’re talking about. Normalcy has no place here. The Vols have mashed opponents so frequently and so thoroughly that it has become nearly inconceivable that they’d lose to anyone, much less a bunch of nobodies from the backwoods North Carolina town of Buies Creek, south of Raleigh.

In the third inning of Tennessee’s eventual 12-7 victory over Campbell University on Saturday night in Knoxville, however, such a fate actually became conceivable. At that moment, we glimpsed that the Big Orange ship isn’t unsinkable after all.

The Fighting Camels (not to be confused with peaceful camels) took a 4-0 lead on the Fighting Vols in the third inning, and it could have been worse. SEC pitcher of the year Chase Dollander departed with the bases loaded and 70 pitches thrown to get eight outs. Tennessee reliever Kirby Connell entered – seriously, how clutch was the mustache in this game? – and coerced a pop-up from Tyler Halstead to end the threat. It was the season’s most important out.

Had the deficit kept growing, the Vols’ lineup would have faced a tougher task without one of its best players in Evan Russell, who returned Saturday, but didn’t start, after Friday’s absence for personal health reasons.

And Dollander’s third-inning exit was stunning. If Campbell’s hitters could do that to arguably the best pitcher in college baseball, what couldn’t they do? At the very least, they were poised to tax Tennessee’s bullpen, which would prove costly should the Vols lose this game and have to win three in the next two days to advance.

The Vols weren't used to this. They were on their heels, against the ropes in their own stadium, facing the type of adversity they’d seldom faced all season.

The biggest lingering question about a Tennessee team with so few weaknesses: What would happen when things inevitably grew difficult in the NCAA Tournament? Would the Vols freeze? Lose their mojo? Let the pressure of being overwhelming tournament favorites hinder them?

In harsher terms: would they choke?

You couldn't know for sure. This season has just been so easy.

At 55-7, the Vols had trailed, but not often. Hadn’t always gone well when they did, either. I’m thinking primarily about their wood-bat game against Tennessee Tech back on April 12 at Smokies Stadium. The Vols showed up with a 23-game win streak and lost 3-2 in front of a large crowd, failing to score in the final six innings while clearly pressing against an opponent that wasn’t in their class.

Thanks to Campbell, we were about to learn something about Tennessee's juggernaut.

And so we did.

Didn't take long, either. Three runs in the fourth inning. Four more in the fifth inning, including Drew Gilbert’s three-run home run on an 0-2 pitch, to reclaim the lead and control of a game that was slipping away.

“Any time someone scores, our mentality is just punch back,” Gilbert said. “I think it’s as simple as that.”

Perhaps we knew this about Tennessee. But the regular season is different. Losing to Campbell on Saturday would have had dire consequences.

Instead, it was a test that Tennessee passed, thanks to an immediate and necessary response at the plate and on the mound, where Connell worked four critical innings to help preserve other arms.

Wasn’t the end of it, though. Campbell didn’t go away, and it took nearly four hours and every one of Tennessee’s four home runs to finally feel comfortable.

Campbell earned Tennessee's respect. You could tell it after the game.

There is a justifiable arrogance to these Vols that has been bred by their success. It pops up in well-meaning comments like Tony Vitello so vehemently applauding Campbell pitcher Cade Kuehler afterward for a start in which he allowed seven earned runs in seven innings on Saturday.

An ERA of 9.00 isn't good against anyone. But, see, the Vols aren't just anyone.

“That box score doesn’t do (him) justice,” Vitello said. “I hope he can sleep well tonight – and that’s Kuehler. That’s some freakish stuff. I don’t know how the box score reads what it does, but he pitched with a lot of heart and good stuff. …

“(We were) just fortunate to win that thing.”

Vitello wasn’t wrong.

Kuehler deserves credit for making mighty Tennessee sweat. You could say that for all the Camels. Indeed, they had plenty of fight on them.

The Vols should be appreciative. They needed a test like that.

Reach Tennessean sports columnist Gentry Estes at gestes@tennessean.com and on Twitter @Gentry_Estes. 

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee baseball needed the test it got from Campbell