Texas baseball slept on smooth silk sheets over the first two rounds of the Austin Regional.
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Texas Longhorns designated hitter Ethan Mendoza (5) runs home for a score during the NCAA Baseball Regional game against UC Santa Barbara at UFCU Disch-Falk Field on Sunday, May 301 2026 in Austin.
Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman
Texas Longhorns short stop Adrian Rodriguez (24) celebrates a score during the NCAA Baseball Regional game against UC Santa Barbara at UFCU Disch-Falk Field on Sunday, May 301 2026 in Austin.
Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman
After winning their first two NCAA Tournament games by a combined 32 runs against overmatched Holy Cross and Tarleton State, the Longhorns finally got a real test Sunday. And it was just what they needed.
Sunday’s 6-4 regional title win over UC Santa Barbara — Aiden Robbins, who was named the regional’s most outstanding player, delivered a massive two-run homer in the seventh inning — could have gone the opposite way at UFCU Disch-Falk Field. It was wild, wooly and unpredictable, but coach Jim Schlossnagle pushed the perfect late pitching button to deliver the program its 14th super regional appearance.
Texas Longhorns outfielder Aiden Robbins (43) celebrates a home run during the NCAA Baseball Regional game against UC Santa Barbara at UFCU Disch-Falk Field on Sunday, May 301 2026 in Austin.
Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman
TEXAS VS. OREGON
When/where: Friday-Sunday, UFCU Disch-Falk Field.
TV/radio: TBA.
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Sign up for Cedric Golden’s newsletter for hot takes and expert analysis each Tuesday on Texas Longhorns football and beyond. It’s called Ced’s Corner, from the mind of the American-Statesman’s resident sports columnist who was named the NSMA’s 2025 Texas Sportswriter of the Year.
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Some boxers believe the only way to get fully engaged in a big prizefight is to get popped in the mouth early. A few football players have told me the same thing. A solid hit takes away the nerves. So credit the Gauchos, who had eliminated Tarleton State earlier in the day, for hitting the Horns early and for squeezing every drop of gas from their collective tank after playing nine innings earlier just for a chance to play one more game.
They gave the fresher, deeper Longhorns all they could handle.
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“We knew that we were going to win the game, even when we went down the first inning,” Robbins said. “We had great energy all day.”
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Upcoming super regional opponent Oregon, which swept through its Eugene Regional with three straight wins, will roll into the 512 this week believing they can end Texas’ season in a best-of-three series. Texas (43-13) showed it can bludgeon the opposition and eke out a tight one. Winning on a night when things didn’t always go well can prove fruitful moving forward. The Horns will take this result over the fate that befell top-seeded UCLA, which got shown the door by St. Mary’s.
MORE BASEBALL: Best photos from the Austin Regional
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Texas Longhorns outfielder Aiden Robbins (43) and his team celebrate winning the NCAA Baseball Regional game against UC Santa Barbara at UFCU Disch-Falk Field on Sunday, May 301 2026 in Austin.
Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman
A nice scrap is what the No. 6 seed needed to stay lathered up for the program’s first super regional since 2022 and Schlossnagle’s 10th.
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“Any conference, whether it’s the Big West or elite Division I baseball — especially this time of the year — it’s just going to be a dogfight,” Schlossnagle said. “We told (the players) before the weekend that it was going to be really, really hard. Next week is going to be really, really hard. You have great teams like this that are confident and playing for their lives and you’re getting closer and closer to Omaha, then you know it’s going to be tough.”
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How it went down for Texas
One week after throwing two relief innings in the SEC Tournament loss to Arkansas, Texas’ No. 2 starter Luke Harrison got the call Sunday with much bigger stakes at play in the ninth inning.
Freshman closer Sam Cozart got roughed up for five hits in only 1⅓ innings and UCSB center fielder Rowan Kelly’s eighth-inning single came within inches of leaving the park to tie the game. Texa’ big right-hander loaded the bases in the ninth and recorded two outs before Schlossnagle called upon Harrison to face Kelly, who had already hit three homers in the regional, including a first-inning solo shot against Texas starter Ruger Riojas.
It took two pitches for Harrison to finish the job on a flyout for his first save since 2024.
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Texas Longhorns pitcher Luke Harrison (53) and catcher Carson Tinney (8) celebrate winning the NCAA Baseball Regional game against UC Santa Barbara at UFCU Disch-Falk Field on Sunday, May 301 2026 in Austin.
Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman
“I knew that everyone believed in me and I believed in myself,” Harrison said.
The craziness of this game made for tremendous viewing for the 7,884 who packed Disch-Falk. Robbins was center stage. He brought the fans to their feet with his team-leading 23rd homer in the seventh, one inning after plunking teammate Temo Becerra with an errant throw on a wacky bunt play that allowed the Gauchos to take a 3-2 lead.
The error aside, Robbins is box office and the Horns have the juice behind him to win in a slugfest or a tight nailbiter like we witnessed.
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“When Robbins come to the plate, everybody in the dugout gets a little bit extra fired up,” Harrison said. “Obviously, he’s a great player on the field, but everybody just loves the teammate that he is, the kind of guy he is and the way he carries himself.”
Texas is a program built for Omaha
UCSB coach Andrew Checketts, who called the Longhorns the New York Yankees three times in the postgame presser, said the Horns are not only built to win this year but for years to come because of the talent this place brings and the support it gets to maintain its status as a college baseball factory.
“I think in this day and age when you’re talking about resources and infrastructure and they feel a little bit like walking into that (stadium) with all that stuff, they look every bit of the modern-day SEC baseball powerhouse in terms of the physicality side of it,” Checketts said.
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The Horns hitting .376 as a team and slugging .761 would attest to the physical part of it. The game-day atmosphere speaks for itself.
Schlossnagle’s history suggests his team is Omaha-bound since seven of his last nine super regional clubs have made college baseball’s final eight. That said, the Ducks (43-16) aren’t waddling in here this weekend to hand it over without a fight.
Thanks to UCSB, the Horns took a good punch and look fully engaged for whatever comes next.
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And in case you’re wondering, Schlossnagle prefers cotton sheets to silk.