By Eric Olson
The Associated Press

OMAHA, Neb. - Even after a 12-2 loss to Rice on Monday, Texas coach Augie Garrido believes his team has what it takes to repeat as the College World Series champion.

"It's been characteristic of this team to fight back and battle," Garrido said.

The Longhorns came back to win the Big 12 conference tournament after a loss to Texas A&M cost them a share of the regular-season title. They did it the hard way, too, losing to Texas A&M in the second game of the tournament but then beating the Aggies twice to reach the title game.

In that game, Texas blew a two-run lead in the ninth inning before Curtis Thigpen won it in the 10th with a two-run homer.

In their NCAA regional in Austin, the Longhorns had to come back from a loss to Lamar to advance.

In the super regional, they beat top seed Florida State in Tallahassee to earn their 30th trip to the CWS.

Now, the Longhorns must beat Miami on Tuesday and would then have to defeat Rice twice to advance to the best-of-three championship series that starts Saturday.

"We'll have to have a championship performance from someone," Garrido said. "This is where someone has to do something not normally expected of them."

After using seven pitchers Monday, Garrido said the likely candidates to start against Miami are freshmen Sam LeCure (4-0) and J. Brent Cox (6-0).

Owls pitcher Wade Townsend struck out 10 and gave up two hits in the final six innings, and Rice used a seven-run sixth inning to send Texas to its second-worst loss in its 119-game history at the CWS.

"It was a case of a very good team on a good day and a very good team on a bad day," Rice coach Wayne Graham said.

The loss was the first in six CWS games for the defending national champions, who won four straight here last year and beat Miami 13-2 in their Series opener Saturday.

The margin of Monday's loss came within a run of equaling their most lopsided defeat ever in Omaha -- a 19-8 loss to Arizona in 1963.

"I don't think this redefines us," Garrido said. "We still have the will of a champion and the spirit of a champion."

Miami 7, Southwest Missouri St. 5

Vince Bongiovanni didn't have much time to get nervous about his first College World Series start.

It wasn't until about 12 hours before Monday's elimination game against Southwest Missouri State that the Miami sophomore got the call from coach Jim Morris.

Bongiovanni allowed just two runs, one earned, in six innings and then got relief help from George Huguet and Shawn Valdes-Fauli as the Hurricanes stayed alive.

SMS (40-26) was eliminated in two games in its first trip to the College World Series.

Joey Hooft and Jim Burt homered to lead a 12-hit outburst against three SMS pitchers, but it was Bongiovanni who received most of the credit from Morris.

"Vince pitched the best game of his career in what was a pressure situation," Morris said.

Morris' original plan was to pitch sophomore left-hander Brandon Camardese (9-1) in Miami's second CWS game.

But after watching Rice right-hander Jeff Niemann hold SMS to one hit through eight innings of the Owls' 4-2 first-round win, Morris decided to go with right-hander Bongiovanni against a Bears lineup that has seven right-handed hitters.

SMS got its leadoff man on base in the first five innings but couldn't start a rally.

"I was able to settle down and get a lot of key ground balls," said Bongiovanni (8-4), who scattered nine hits, walked one and struck out four.

Miami took a 6-2 lead into the eighth inning, but it was a one-run game after Shaun Marcum's three-run homer off Huguet.

Valdes-Fauli came on and got pinch-hitter Scott Nasby to ground out, ending the inning.

The Hurricanes added a run in the ninth on Brian Barton's RBI single. Then Valdes-Fauli finished off the Bears by striking out Dant'e Brinkley and Brooks Colvin and getting Rick Wilson on a comebacker. Valdes-Fauli earned his fifth save.

Brad Ziegler (12-2) took the loss, allowing seven hits and four runs in six innings. Only two of the runs against him were earned.

MIAMI BASEBALL

The Pittsburgh Pirates announced the signing of hometown product Michael Carlin to a free-agent contract with their minor league organization in Bradenton, Fla. The senior outfielder, MU's career home run leader (44), batted .332 this season while producing single-season school records of 68 RBI and 19 home runs.