Tag: Lebarron Johnson Jr.

Texas baseball begins quest for trip No. 39 to College World Series

Texas’ final baseball season in the Big 12 and journey to Omaha starts Friday night.

Baseball excellence resumes in Austin on Friday night. The Texas Longhorns will open their final Big 12 baseball season with a nonconference battle with San Diego Toreros, the university that produced MLB star Kris Bryant, at Disch-Falk Field.

The Longhorns are widely viewed as a contender to make the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska. The program is head and shoulders above the rest of college baseball in World Series appearances with 38. They will look to make it 39 in 2024.

The upcoming season marks the end of Big 12 baseball for Texas after playing in the league since 1997. It sets up big matchups with recent baseball rivals TCU and Texas Tech among others.

Starting pitcher Labarron Johnson Jr. leads the Longhorns into what projects to be a memorable season. Fellow pitcher Tanner Witt, outfielder Porter Brown, third baseman Peyton Powell, outfielder Jared Thomas and second baseball Jack O’Dowd return as key players for the team.

Freshman Will Gasparino was at one point given a Top-100 draft rating, but instead chose to play outfield for Texas. The top prospect could play a big role in improving the Texas lineup in 2024.

The schedule features plenty of teams that should fire up Texas faithful. The Astros Foundation College Classic at Minute Maid park gives the Longhorns matchups with the LSU Tigers, Texas State Bobcats and Vanderbilt Commodores. That slate begins with the Tigers on Mar. 1.

LSU, of course, comes off a national title victory in 2023. Vanderbilt has made two of the last four World Series finals and won it all in 2019 while Texas State has been a program on the rise in recent seasons. The trio of games won’t determine the success of the season, but will provide NCAA tournament-quality opponents early in the year.

Texas follows the classic invitational with Texas A&M at home on March 5. Next, the team faces a three-game road battle over that weekend with Texas Tech March 8-10.

In other notable games for the year, the Longhorns will play host to the Washington Huskies (Mar. 15-17), TCU Horned Frogs (April 19-21) and Oklahoma State Cowboys (May 3-5). The team will face Oklahoma in Norman, April 26-28.

Texas has the pieces to contend for Omaha again in 2024. They begin that championship push on Friday against San Diego at 7 p.m. CT on the Longhorn Network.

Big 12 Conference announces yearly baseball awards

Texas led the way with the most players earning all-conference honors.

The Big 12 Conference announced its annual awards on Tuesday ahead of this week’s conference tournament.

This season’s awards are headlined by JJ Wetherholt (West Virginia) as Player of the Year and Lucas Gordon (Texas) as Pitcher of the Year. WVU’s Randy Mazey won coach of the year after guiding the Mountaineers to a share of the Big 12 title.

Texas led the way with the most players earning all-conference honors.

P Lucas Gordon (first-team), P Lebarron Johnson Jr. (first-team), OF Dylan Campbell (first-team), OF Porter Brown (first-team), C Garrett Guillemette (first-team), IF Peyton Powell (second-team) and IF Jared Thomas (freshman-team).

The 2022 Longhorns only had four players selected for the first team. David Pierce and his players deserve props for their development this season.

The Big 12 baseball tournament takes place from Wednesday-Sunday at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas. It is the last chance for teams to boost their resumes before the NCAA Tournament selection show.

Here is a full look at the 2023 Big 12 Baseball Award winners.

Texas tops No. 6 West Virginia 10-4, moving one win away from Big 12 title

Texas looks to clinch a share of the Big 12 regular season title and the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament on Saturday.

Texas baseball clinched a massive series victory over No. 6 West Virginia on Friday night. The 10-4 win and an Oklahoma State loss sets up a de facto Big 12 championship game on Saturday.

For the second straight night, Texas jumped out to a big early lead.

Dylan Campbell got the Longhorns’ offense going with an RBI double in the first inning. Campbell extend his record hitting streak to 32 games and added another home run later in the game.

Eric Kennedy and Jared Thomas would homer to break the game open early on.

Seven runs in the first two innings were all Texas flamethrowing righty Lebarron Johnson Jr would need. He struck out 11 Mountaineer hitters, allowing just two runs in 5.1 innings of work. Ace Whitehead provided some valuable outs out of the bullpen.

Texas looks to clinch a share of the Big 12 regular season title and the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament on Saturday. Tanner Witt gets the ball in the most important game of the year for the Horns.

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Texas Baseball: Lebarron Johnson Jr. earns Big 12 Pitcher of the Week

LBJ earns Big 12 honors after his 12 strikeout performance.

Lebarron Johnson Jr. took home Big 12 Pitcher of the Week following his stellar performance against Kansas on Saturday. Johnson joins Lucas Gordon as Longhorns to earn the award this season.

After dropping game one on Friday, Johnson set Texas up to bounce back and eventually win the crucial road series.

Johnson struck out a career-high 12 Jayhawks across seven innings of one-run baseball. He lowered his ERA to 2.53 and picked up his fifth victory of the season.

The flame-throwing righty is putting it together down the stretch of the season. Johnson has thrown 18-plus innings, striking out 24 batters and allowing just one run in his last three outings.

The recent emergence of Johnson is a big development for Texas baseball. The one-two punch of ace Lucas Gordon and Johnson makes Texas a dangerous team in a postseason format.

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