Mississauga’s Davis looking to lead Vanderbilt in return to College World Series
Published June 17, 2021 at 8:59 pm
Mississauga’s Cooper Davis is off to the College World Series.
The St. Aloysius Gonzaga graduate and his Vanderbilt Commodores open the eight-team NCAA championship baseball tournament Saturday against Arizona in Omaha, Neb.
The 22-year-old was part of the Commodores team that made the trek in 2019, but the outfielder was a younger member on the roster and didn’t get to see any action.
Vanderbilt has made five trips to the College World Series, winning two national titles in 2014 and 2019 and finishing runner-up in 2015.
The COVID-19 pandemic shut down last year’s tournament.
“It definitely feels like something more special after we had last season taken away, we’ve been locked up for a long time. So if definitely feels really special to get this opportunity to go back there,” Davis told the Canadian Press. said Davis, who instead chose to attend the Tennessee University after being drafted in the 25th round by the Toronto Blue Jays in the 2017 MLB Draft.
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The NCAA tournament is split into two double-elimination brackets with the bracket winners meeting in a best-of-three final.
Vanderbilt (45-15) finds themselves in a bracket with Arizona (45-16), North Carolina State (35-18) and Stanford (38-15).
The other bracket features Texas (47-15), Tennessee (50-16), Mississippi State (45-16) and Virginia (34-25).
Davis, a sociology major and business minor, was drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays in the 25th round of the 2017 MLB Draft, but instead chose to attend the Tennessee University.
“I knew the right move was definitely to go to college and get an education and play college baseball,” said the five-foot-10, 190-pound Davis who is eligible for the July 11-13 draft.
“Because there’s so many different experiences that I wouldn’t have gotten — like going to two College World Series, getting a degree and doing all these different things that are really important that I might have missed out on had I joined professional baseball.”
CANADIAN PRESS PHOTO
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