North Carolina Tar Heels ace reliever Caden Glauber threw only eight pitches in the decisive College World Series Finals Game 3 against the Oklahoma Sooners. After the dust settled on Oklahoma’s 13-2 victory, one of the biggest talking points became about Glauber’s role.
Just one day ago, Glauber delivered an incredible performance in UNC’s 6-2 victory that forced a winner-take-all Game 3 in the first place. In Game 2 against Oklahoma, he tossed five scoreless innings, allowing only one hit and striking out eight batters. He improved his season record to 12-0.
Since he threw 70 high-intensity pitches in Game 2, the chance for him to get an extended outing in Game 3 was tough. This put North Carolina head coach Scott Forbes in a dilemma on how to maximize Glauber’s chance.
His strategy to use Glauber as an emergency option fell into disarray after Oklahoma erupted early. He came into the fifth inning, threw eight pitches, without recording an out and exited with North Carolina trailing 7-1.
After the game, several North Carolina fans called out the Tar Heels’ management and their coaches for not being able to get the best out of Glauber in the most important game of the year.
“This is 100% the fault of the UNC coaching staff. Caden Glauber shouldn’t even be picking up a baseball today, I feel for the kid,” one fan wrote.
“MLB trying to sell us that college is the best place to develop players, while I’m watching an 18-year-old who threw 5 innings yesterday come into a game today in a 2-0 count with runners on will take incredible sales skills,” another fan added.
“This. Forbes set Glauber up for failure on this. The extended game pauses. Slow walk to the mound. I love Glauber and he’s a stud, but that was terrible game management,” another fan noted.
“Sure, let’s use the literal last game of a notoriously chaotic postseason as an indictment of the whole sport!!!!!” one fan said.
“Glauber throwing on zero rest after 70 pitches yesterday. Does #UNC HC Scott Forbes even remotely care about arm health?” one fan asked.
“WELP, it looks like Carolina baseball is gonna come up just short again of a national championship…….and to add insult to injury I’m pretty confident we’ll lose Caden Glauber to a higher bidding team in the portal,” one fan added.
Caden Glauber’s Struggle in Game 3 Explained by North Carolina HC
Caden Glauber didn’t look alright in Game 3, struggling on the bump and arguably taking time to get going with his pitches. This led to a discussion with the umpires. It appeared as if Glauber’s arm wasn’t really in great health; however, Scott Forbes thought the issue was something else.
The Tar Heels’ head coach pointed out that the umpires were starting a pitch clock earlier. He said:
“I felt like they started the clock a little bit too quick on Glauber,” Forbes said during his ESPN interview after fourth inning. “Obviously, they have a clock operator here. But we’ve gotta adjust. I’m not gonna play the blame game. We don’t make excuses here. It is what it is. We don’t make excuses here. We just gotta flush it and we gotta just get back to playing.”
Nonetheless, Glauber finished the 2026 season on a high note. In his first season in Chapel Hill, he finished with a perfect 12-0 record, striking out over 100 hitters in 92 innings pitched with a 2.01 ERA.
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