Friday night’s 4-1 win over New Mexico State marked the 600th career win for Texas A&M baseball coach Rob Childress. The win also marked A&M’s third in a row.
Childress said he is appreciative of the support he has received during his time at A&M.
“Getting the 600, there is just a lot of great players that have come over the past years and some amazing assistant coaches, including the ones that are still here and others that have gone on,” Childress said. “Just amazing support staff that we’ve had over the years to put us all in a great position, and not only that but the donors here at Texas A&M that have given us an opportunity to be really good each and every year. Most of all, the 12th Man, the fans, just very thankful for all those people, and there is just a lot of people who have gone into it over the years. Just time to look back and be thankful and appreciative of all the great people that are surrounding this place.”
With the win, Childress is the second-fastest baseball coach in the SEC and eighth-fastest NCAA Division I baseball coach to reach the 600 career wins mark, doing so in 915 games.
The Aggies kicked off the scoring in the bottom of the first after Will Frizzell plated Ray Alejo on an RBI single.
New Mexico State tied up the game in the top of the fourth on a passed ball. It would be the only run A&M starting pitcher Dustin Saenz would give up in the game. Saenz would go on to throw 7.2 innings of one run ball while striking out nine New Mexico State batters.
The Aggies took the lead in the bottom of the sixth after a run was scored on a sacrifice bunt from Zane Schmidt. A&M led 2-1 going into the seventh inning.
A&M broke the game open after Frizell hit a 2 RBI single up the middle. Frizzell led the team offensively with 3 RBI.
Frizzell spoke to how A&M was able to score runs off New Mexico State without getting extra-base hits.
“It speaks a lot to everything that we do,” Frizzell said. “We take batting practice differently on a day like today. Coach Chad Caillet does a great job of really trying to get us to hit more two-iron fly balls and really flatten it out. We had a lot of swings today that probably would’ve been extra-base hits on a normal day at the ballpark. We started to knock them down late with the fly balls, so it was nice.”
The Aggies resume their three-game homes series against New Mexico State Saturday afternoon. First pitch at Blue Bell Park is set for 2 p.m.