It might take some time, but the 2026 UW-Milwaukee baseball team will soon realize the magnitude of what it accomplished.
In the immediate aftermath, the Panthers only felt the pain of a missed opportunity after their season ended in an 8-3 loss to Auburn in a winner-take-all “Game 7” of a NCAA Tournament regional final June 1 in Auburn, Alabama.
There will likely be reunions of this team in the future, with head coach Shaun Wegner and players swapping stories about how a team of “misfit toys” started a season 5-23 before getting to the brink of the super regionals while battling one of the top teams in the nation on its home turf of Plainsman Park.
They’ll talk about Joey Spence’s walk-off home run in the Horizon League tournament that set everything in motion. They’ll shake their heads at how they opened the NCAAs 2-0 by scoring 26 combined runs against Auburn and Central Florida, the tail end of nine-game winning streak that caught the fancy of the baseball world, including Milwaukee Brewers manager Pat Murphy.
UWM only had one previous NCAA Tournament victory before this run.
Alas, there just wasn’t enough magic in UWM’s bats and the Panthers’ pitchers ran out of ammunition for their slingshots against Goliath.
Top-seeded Auburn roared back from that stunning 13-8 loss to fourth-seeded UWM in the regional opener, beating the Panthers twice in a 24-hour period to advance.
The Panthers had one last attempt at making history during decisive game, getting a two-run homer from John Hadley VI in the fourth inning to tie the game at 2-2.
But the Tigers flexed their muscles in the sixth inning. Chase Fralick, one of the top catchers in the nation, connected for a solo homer to grab back the lead.
Fralick’s blast was his sixth homer in Auburn’s four regional games. This one opened the floodgates, with the Tigers scoring four more runs in the sixth for a 7-2 lead that ignited the home crowd.
When UWM’s Christian Holmes struck out in the top of the ninth to end the game, there were tears and hugs and thousand-yard stares in the Panthers’ dugout.
But those players will soon realize just what they did together.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: UW-Milwaukee baseball’s dream run in NCAA Tournament ended by Auburn
Reporting by Ben Steele, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
