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Olivia Sayer
Georgia sophomore Leighton Finley (12) pitches during a NCAA college baseball game between Alabama and Georgia at Foley Field in Athens, Georgia, on Saturday, March 23, 2024. Georgia won 6-5. (Photo/Mady Mertens: @MadyMertensPhotography)
After pitching six innings of shutout ball, Leighton Finley walked towards his home dugout at Foley Field. There, teammates swarmed him with many hugs and handshakes.
Finley stole the show in Georgia baseball’s series-opening 10-0 victory over No. 13 Vanderbilt Friday night. The sophomore right-hander allowed just three hits in Georgia’s 11th run-rule victory of the season and first shutout of an SEC opponent.
“He dealt with a little adversity in the first,” head coach Wes Johnson said. “After that, it was lights out.”
Finley’s career-high 11 strikeouts tied for the most by a Georgia pitcher this season. His performance can be partly attributed to an in-game adjustment with his grip.
“After the first, the slider wasn’t working well,” Finley said. “In the second inning, I started tweaking it a little bit and moved my thumb a little bit on it, and it started working a lot better.”
Johnson said he did not think Finley was dominating the ball with the proper finger at first. As the game progressed, Finley adjusted his grip, while still maintaining spin on the ball.
Georgia’s offense also continued its record-setting season, blasting three home runs in the contest. Charlie Condon set the tone in the first inning when he hammered a pitch to left field for his NCAA-leading 31st round-tripper of the season.
“It just takes the weight off of everyone’s shoulders,” Paul Toetz, who finished the game 3-for-4, said of Condon’s home run. “[Vanderbilt] is the pinnacle, like one of the teams in college baseball that everyone thinks about. When [Condon] goes and hits the ball 115 [mph] to Stegeman, everyone’s like ‘Ok, we can do this.”’
While the home runs are what brought the crowd of 4,027 to its feet, it was the lack of strikeouts that impressed Johnson. The Bulldogs only struck out three times in the game, which is relatively low for a team that hits for power.
“When you’re not chasing and you’re not striking out, you put a lot of pressure on their guys to have to come to the plate,” Johnson said. “And our guys got off some swings today.”
Cutting down on strikeouts is something Georgia has worked hard hard to emphasize this season, as its opponents have often baited the team to chase outside of the strike zone.
“A lot of teams pitch the Bulldogs different,” Toetz said. “Just because we’re having a great offensive year. So, we know that teams are going to come in and try to throw a lot of balls and make us chase, and we’ve worked a lot on that the whole year. So, I think it’s just us focusing on getting good pitches to hit and being so locked in on each at-bat.”
This approach paid dividends against Vanderbilt, as the Bulldogs tagged reigning SEC pitcher of the week Bryce Cunningham for five runs in three innings. An RBI-double off the bat of Fernando Gonzalez forced Cunningham, who was coming off a complete game shutout against Mississippi State, to exit early.
In the fifth, a three-run homer by Toetz strengthened Georgia’s lead, while a two-run shot by Slate Alford in the sixth broke the game open for the Bulldogs.
Georgia will looks to take the series Saturday at 2 p.m. Charlie Goldstein, who was limited with shoulder fatigue, will make his return to the starting rotation for the Bulldogs.