OMAHA – This place was Starkville North on Monday, awash in maroon and the clang of cowbells and anticipation that Mississippi State was closing in on history.
Just one more inconvenience for UCLA to brush aside.
One of the nation's best pitching staffs turned in another strong performance, from starter Adam Plutko to record-setting closer David Berg, and right-fielder Eric Filia delivered a pair of key hits as the Bruins defeated Mississippi State 3-1, drawing first blood in the College World Series' best-of-three finals.
It's they, and not the Bulldogs, who are another victory away from the first national championship in their program's history. The two teams meet again tonight, a do-or-die game for Mississippi State, a potential gala for UCLA.
"It's one game. I've told the team that there's not much to get excited about," UCLA coach John Savage said. "It gets down to tomorrow."
"What we're going to try to do," Bulldogs coach John Cohen said, "is just put everything behind us and try to win two ballgames. Because I think we're very, very capable.
"But so is UCLA."
Plutko , the Bruins' top starter and an 11th-round pick by Cleveland in this month's major-league draft, allowed just four hits and a walk in six-plus innings to win his second game of the Series. Three relievers strung together three innings of zeroes.
A UCLA offense hitting just .183 in the Series didn't provide a lot of backing, but enough: six hits bunched in the first four innings, the biggest a two-out, two-run single by Filia that put UCLA up 3-0 in the top of the fourth.
Berg, the Pac-12 Conference's Pitcher of the Year, closed it out for his third save of the Series and Division I-record 24th of the season, choking off a two-out threat in the ninth by inducing a comebacker to the mound from MSU pinch-hitter Jacob Robson.
Savage's caution and Cohen's confidence notwithstanding, there's no overstating the significance of the first-game win. Only once in the past 10 years, going back to the College World Series' switch to its current format in 2003, has the winner of the best-of-three finals opener failed to go on to win the title. Seven times, it has completed a sweep – one of them by South Carolina over UCLA in 2010.
The only first-game loser to come back to win two: Fresno State in 2008, overtaking Georgia.
"I really believe in our kids," Cohen insisted, "and I think they're going to handle this in a positive way."
He and his players left TD Ameritrade Park respectful of a resourceful UCLA team but shaking their collective heads at what they felt was the Bruins' good fortune. Their first run, in the first inning, was the product of a bouncing strike-three pitch that hit the mask of Mississippi State catcher Nick Ammirati and allowed Kevin Kramer to reach first.
Three innings later, the Bulldogs pushed across a run on a bases-loaded walk to cut their deficit to 3-1 and still had the bases loaded with two out. Designated hitter Trey Porter jumped on a Plutko pitch, lining it to right but right at UCLA's Filia.
State starter Trevor Fitts and reliever Chad Giroda struck out 12 UCLA batters. Bruins pitchers, for all their effectiveness, struck out only two.
"That's not an equation we lose (on) a whole lot," Cohen said. "… You have to make your luck in this game, but some things happened tonight. That's just how it works."
Said first baseman Wes Rea, who reached base once when he was hit by a pitch but otherwise went 0-for-3 in the game, "You can call it luck, call it getting it done. We just didn't get it done."
UCLA has seen a gauntlet of seeded opponents in this postseason and nonetheless swept nine games – three in its regional in Los Angeles, two in its super regional against fifth-seeded Cal State Fullerton in Fullerton and now four in Omaha. It knocked off fourth-seeded LSU in its Series opener, then No. 1 North Carolina last Friday to get to join Mississippi State in the finals.
Monday brought what Savage called "kind of a Bruin game." Tight. Tense. And positive signs from the start. UCLA established its three-run lead, in part, on first-time-through-the-order hits by Filia and shortstop Pat Valaika, who'd been a combined 2-for-19 in their first three Series games.
The Bruins, who'd scored just eight runs in those three games, also capitalized on every opening they got from Mississippi State.
The first came on the first-inning third strike that got away. Filia followed with a double and Valaika with an RBI-single to center.
State contributed an error in the top of the fourth inning, and UCLA made the Bulldogs pay. After a one-out single by Brenton Allen, leadoff hitter Brian Carroll pushed a perfect sacrifice bunt up the third-base line that Ammirati grabbed and threw away at first. Two batters later, with two out, Filia stroked a full-count, two-RBI single to left off the left-handed Giroda.
Three runs. With a pitching staff allowing just a single run a game in the Series, it looked like a mountain.
Plutko, a junior right-hander who won UCLA's Series opener two Sundays ago, retired the first 10 Mississippi State hitters he faced before wobbling in the bottom of the fourth. He gave up a couple of singles, hit a batter, then walked the Bulldogs' C.T. Bradford to force in a run.
But he escaped the bases-loaded threat on Porter's inning-ending line-out.
Mississippi State put its first two runners on base in the seventh, but saw the rally stall when UCLA second baseman Cody Regis turned a hard, groundball shot to his right into a double play – one of several slick plays made by the senior.
The eighth and ninth innings were left to Berg, the 6-foot sophomore who now has finished all four of the Bruins' World Series wins.
"Really," he said, "the last 24 saves don't mean a thing. The only one that matters is the next one. … Got to live in the present. Can't worry about the past.
"If we win a national title, I'll go enjoy that," he said of the record. "But a record without going out and winning this thing really wouldn't be worth it."
State fans have flocked to this World Series, and they encircled TD Ameritrade Park for much of Monday in a wet, patient wait for tickets. Not only is their baseball program – the 16th-winningest in the NCAA's Division I – without a national title. The school is yet to win its first in any team sport. For that matter, there are precious few to none across a state that has no professional sports franchise and dotes on its college teams.
UCLA thirsts, too. The Bruins rank among the 30 winningest programs in Division I, ahead of the likes of Miami (Fla.), Florida and LSU. They came within two victories of a Series title in 2010.
This is the first time they've been within one.
PHOTOS: COLLEGE WORLD SERIES
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