LEXINGTON ? One day after capturing its first Southeastern Conference championship in school history, the fourth-ranked Kentucky baseball team was unable to capture the magic of its first 29 league games and dropped a 4-0 decision to No. 11 Georgia at Foley Field.
The loss wraps up the most successful regular season in history for UK, which fell to 42-13 overall and 20-10 in the SEC. Both win totals are school records.
The Wildcats await the result of Saturday night?s Alabama-Tennessee game to learn their SEC Tournament seed. Kentucky earns the No. 1 seed with a Volunteer win and the No. 2 slot with a Crimson Tide victory. The tournament begins Wednesday in Birmingham, Ala.
Georgia scored its runs via a number of well-placed ground balls. The Bulldogs first nine hits were all singles, seven on grounders that snuck through the infield. The first run was plated in the first after a Michael Bertram error at third base extended the inning for a Brian Felmy RBI single up the middle.
In the third, Georgia plated two more. After back-to-back singles to leadoff, a sac bunt and an intentional walk, two straight fielder?s choices got the runs home. On the first, second baseman John Shelby ranged towards the hole at first, turned and fired to second, but failed to get the runner. That left them loaded for a Jason Jacobs? RBI fielder?s choice grounder to short.
The fourth run came home on three straight two-out singles in the sixth that chased starter Greg Dombrowski. He took the loss to fall to 9-2 on the year after going 5 2/3 innings and allowing four runs ? three earned ? on nine hits.
Kentucky wasted plenty of opportunities after getting the leadoff man aboard in each of the first six innings. However, twice he was erased on a double play and UK left eight men on base in that span. For the game, the Wildcats stranded 11 and went 1-for-20 with runners on.
Rip Warren earned his second win in the series in relief to improve to 8-2 on the year. He worked three innings and gave up a single hit while fanning a pair. Josh Fields closed out the final 1 1/3 innings for his 15th save. Nathan Moreau got a no-decision after scattering five hits in 4 2/3 scoreless innings.
Kentucky was shutout for the first time in 62 games, snapping the eighth-longest shutout-free streak in school annals. Bertram provided three of Kentucky?s seven hits while raising his average to .349 for the year. Antone DeJesus, Ryan Strieby, Ryan Wilkes and Shaun Lehmann all added base knocks as well.
