Tennessee baseball head coach Tony Vitello revealed his pitching plan for the series finale against Hofstra.
Junior RHP Nate Snead will start for the Vols as UT looks to sweep the season-opening series.
Tony Vitello says RHP Nate Snead will start Sunday for the #Vols against Hofstra. pic.twitter.com/lUvaSy5Xm3
— Jack Foster (@jackfostermedia) February 15, 2025
“[Nate] Snead will start, and then we’ll go from there,” Vitello said. “Obviously [Andrew] Behnke, he’s not thrown yet. We had him down there. Combs has not thrown yet. There’s several freshmen that are probably looking in between every inning to see if they need to run down to the pen and have their first career outing.”
More From RTI: Tennessee Baseball Clinches Hofstra Series With Dominant, Run-Rule Victory
Snead has been a candidate to be a weekend starter all offseason. With Liam Doyle and Marcus Phillips earning starts on Friday and Saturday, respectively, the options for Sunday were Snead, Dylan Loy, Brandon Arvidson and Tegan Kuhns.
Arvidson threw Saturday, dwindling the options further. Expect to see Loy out of the bullpen on Sunday as well as Andrew Behnke, Ryan Combs and others.
Snead will receive his second start as a Vol and first of the season. Snead’s lone start in 2024 came in Tennessee’s loss to Vanderbilt in Hoover. The outing was by far the worst of Snead’s season, as the Wisconsin native gave up five earned runs in 2.2 innings of work.
Tennessee picked up an 18-1 run-rule, series-clinching win on Saturday after a 15-0 run-rule win on Friday. The Vols have tallied six home runs this weekend, all coming from six different individuals.
Doyle was fantastic in his UT debut on Friday, striking out 11 in five scoreless innings. Phillips was solid on Saturday, turning in four scoreless innings in his third career start.
For recaps of Tennessee’s first two wins of the season, click here and here.
Sunday’s series finale is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. ET in Lindsey Nelson Stadium.
