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COLLEGE WORLD SERIES: LUBBOCK SUPER REGIONAL

June 9, 2019

Josh Holliday

Lubbock, Texas

Texas Tech - 8, Oklahoma State - 6

JOSH HOLLIDAY: Proud of the kids. They played great baseball. They've found the true meaning of team. They honored each other in the way that they not went about their business and I'm forever grateful to them. This is one heck of a good team. I'm very proud of this group.

Some real special individuals that allowed this to happen and Colin Simpson's legacy, one of the best power hitters we've had at Oklahoma State in the last be 20 years. The emergence of Trevor Boone, the outstanding pitching of Jensen Elliott down the stretch, and the great work of so many other kids out of that bullpen to pitch us so this point. Just a real special group of kids, I'm proud of them. I thanked them after the game. I'm not sad. I'm proud.

I thanked them for being a joy to coach and letting us as coaches enjoy the love of baseball and team with them and not have to worry about the nonsense that some teams take you through off the field and during the school year. This has been a wonderful group, and I will remember this team with an incredibly special place.

They've reunited our alumni. I've never had so much positive response from players that used to play here for how proud they are to watch how these kids competed, and even though we lost the game today, we won the season, because we achieved real "team," and you can't say that every year you put on your uniform.

That being said, congratulations to Texas Tech and we'll go back to work getting ready for next year.

Q. Josh, what was the decision to bring Joe out of the game there in the eighth?
JOSH HOLLIDAY: We went with the match-ups that we thought were in our best -- best match-ups, best percentages.

Q. Coach, what were those last two innings like for you, back and forth, home runs, pressure packed?
JOSH HOLLIDAY: I think you watched the game, every pitch had a lot of pitch into it, whether it was the kid with the bat in the hand or the kid with the ball in his hand. The kids were competing very hard. The room for error was very small. There wasn't much of a margin. Any pitch not thrown exactly right, whether it was on side to us, or from us to them, pitches that weren't thrown right where you wanted were barrelled, and it was not a good day to be a pitcher if the ball got hit in the air.

Like I said, the room for error at this point in the year, the quality of the kids going head-to-head, the familiarity of the two teams having played now for a sixth time. It's just, like I said, the room for error is very small and comes down to an execution piece, and I think because of that, you felt the intensity that you're speaking of.

Q. Josh, Hueston as a freshman, has had a huge weekend, he's had a really good season. Talk about the impact that he's made in this series and what he can bring to the table moving forward.
JOSH HOLLIDAY: He played very well. He's particularly dangerous on this turf where he can play deep into the right center field area. The turf fields allow you to play your second baseman as deep as you would like, and when he's that far out there he can really go get the ball and cut off hard-hit grounders. He has a strong arm, and he's going to be an excellent young player, very proud of the way he competed.

Q. I know you spoke about the final innings, but the emotional roller coaster of taking the lead in the eighth and your team has come from mind, we talked about it over and over again so many times, and then you get the emotion of them losing the lead in the bottom half. What do you see from the guys in the dugout? Did they go flat or stay the same as they always have?
JOSH HOLLIDAY: I think they answered it for you with the way they responded in the top of the ninth, and they jumped right back on it, as I knew they would. As I told the kids after the game, I hadn't prepared anything to say to them for after the game, because I expected to win, and I mean that out of confidence in the young men, not in any other fashion, just because I believe in them. They're never out of anything, and that's a rare instinct the team developed. I just really believed in them, and I think they've learned to believe in each other and from that, they hung in there.

Yeah, it was a punch in the gut to have that ball go over the fence but what are you going to go? Turn around and jump back in on it, first two guys on base, three good swings to try to put a bat on ball against a good reliever. The kid made the pitches when he needed to. Yeah, they came back for us. We're used to it. We've been back and forth now for quite some time. We haven't played an easy baseball game in two or three months. Today was just another one of those great challenges.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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