Dylan Smith Advances Alabama Baseball to Ruston Regional Semifinals with 'Real Deal' Performance

They call him ‘Da Real Deal.’

With his 116 total pitches and nine complete innings — both career highs — junior starting pitcher Dylan Smith was truly ‘Da Real Deal’ on the mound for Alabama baseball in Saturday’s 3-1 elimination-game victory over Rider, giving the Crimson Tide another day at the Ruston Regional and another opportunity to advance.

After a disappointing loss to NC State in the first game of the regional on Friday, Smith came in clutch for Alabama when the team’s back was against the wall.

“Every day is different,” Smith said. “Your mindset has to change. When we go out there tomorrow, we’re not worried about what just happened in the past. Today is a new day. Gotta move on and dominate that day.”

In total, Smith allowed just one run off seven hits through nine complete innings. He also walked none and struck out seven batters en route to his second win of the season.

“Dylan was just awesome,” Alabama coach Brad Bohannon said. “Just amazing. A complete game, no walks — gave up one run, which probably could have made a play there in the first to keep that from happening — and was just outstanding. He commanded his fastball, threw both of his breaking balls and his split-change for a strike and he was amazing. You can’t say enough about him.”

Smith’s lone run came in the top of the first: a one-out RBI groundout to give the Broncs a one-run edge to start things off. Following that run, Smith only allowed six more baserunners for the rest of the game and left all of them stranded.

Smith only seemed to get better and better as the game transpired. Not only did five of his seven strikeouts occur in the top of the fifth or later, but he also only allowed three hits past the top of the fourth.

“Dylan has kind of shown us throughout the year a lot of times he gets better as the game goes on,” Bohannon said. “I always keep a close eye on how they’re commanding the ball and their velocity and usually you see a loss in command before you see a change in the stuff and Dylan just continued to locate all of his pitches and the velocity never dropped so I was very comfortable whether we scored or not.”

Bohannon also stated that he never even considered going to the bullpen on Saturday thanks to how solid Smith was performing.

“We had Chase [Lee] playing catch if we got into a pinch but really quite honestly never really thought about going to the bullpen,” Bohannon said. “I was really confident in Dylan and I thought he looked great and was gonna kind of trust our odds with sticking with him.”

With a shallow bullpen behind him thanks to two of the Crimson Tide’s top relievers having to be utilized on Friday, Smith’s nine innings dramatically increased the team’s chances to advance even further. By not having to go to the bullpen on Saturday, the team’s full slate of pitchers outside of starter Tyler Ras and Smith are expected to be available.

“We’ve got a tall task trying to win three games in the next two days and the message to the kids will be ‘Let’s just play as hard as we can and try to win that first inning in the first game tomorrow,’” Bohannon said. “But with that being said, you go into the game tomorrow and everybody’s available except for Dylan and Tyler Ras. So two of our really good arms, but I feel like we’ve got several good options for tomorrow and Jacob McNairy will start that first game and I don’t have any doubt that he’ll give us a great start. I feel good about what we’ve got in the pen.”

Alabama will now await the outcome of No. 1 seed Louisiana Tech vs No. 2 seed NC State (6 p.m. CT, ESPN3) in the winners’ bracket. The Crimson Tide will face the loser tomorrow in the regional semifinal (2 p.m. CT on Sunday, ESPN3).

Smith’s performance gives Alabama hope in the regional. While it has had a slow start on offense, the Crimson Tide now has its full arsenal of pitchers at its disposal.

After nine innings and his second win of the season under his belt, Smith is pleased with his performance and the opportunity it gives his team in the regional semifinal.

“That’s my mindset every time I step onto the mound,” Smith said. “I’m trying to go [a complete game]. Obviously I did that today to put our team in a better spot for tomorrow.”