The rally caps didn’t work for Tennessee in game one.

In game two, they weren’t needed.

The Vols split a Saturday day-night doubleheader with Alabama, dropping the first game 11-10 in a seven-homer slugfest and winning the second game in a 13-5 rout.

A crowd of 2,896 at Lindsey Nelson Stadium watched Kentrail Davis and Bryan Morgado steal the show in game two.

Davis, an Alabama native who was recruited by the Crimson Tide, hit two home runs, including a three-run shot to key a seven-run sixth inning for the Vols (21-13, 8-6 SEC).

“It’s a lot more special being against Alabama,” Davis said after going 4-for-8 with six runs and five RBIs for the day. “It felt pretty good, especially to hit two home runs against them.”

Morgado (4-2) had his fourth double-digit strikeout effort of the season with 10. He worked seven innings and allowed one run on five hits.

“He hadn’t had his best stuff the past two weekends (against Auburn and Florida),” UT coach Todd Raleigh said. “Today, he had better stuff.

“He got himself in trouble a couple of times, but when he had to be good, he was really, really good.”

That proved huge for a Tennessee team battling injury woes in the bullpen.

With Aaron Everett (elbow) lost for the season, Danny Wiltz (triceps) day-to-day and Jeff Lockwood (finger) day-to-day as a pitcher, the Vols needed strong efforts from the starters and a big day with the bats.

They responded with 23 runs and 26 hits.

“We’ve been swinging the bats good for a couple of weeks now,” Raleigh said. “It’s just unfortunate in the first game we score 10 and lose.

“We’ve been here over 14 hours today, so to see these guys respond the way they did in the second game was pretty special,”

It was special for Zane Stone as well. The senior pitcher watched his mother Sheila, a cancer survivor, throw out the first pitch. He then came on in relief in the eighth with the bases loaded and one out. He struck out two and ended up finishing game two.

“That was pretty cool,” Raleigh said. “We didn’t plan it that way, but it worked out nice.”

In game one, Alabama (20-16, 6-8) used gusty winds blowing out to left field to hit four home runs and then held off a Tennessee rally.

The Vols managed three solo homers (Cody Brown, Josh Liles and Lockwood), but the Crimson Tide’s homers accounted for eight of their runs and UT stranded 11 baserunners.

UT redshirt freshman Nick Hernandez took the loss after giving up nine earned runs on nine hits in six innings. Hernandez (1-2) stayed in the game after taking a line drive off the leg in the third.

UT’s Danny Lima went 3-for-4 while Davis, Lockwood, Brown and P.J. Polk each went 2-for-5. Lockwood had three RBIs.

Tennessee trailed 11-9 in the ninth, loaded the bases with no outs, but could manage just one run on a sacrifice fly by Davis.

The series finale is scheduled for a 2 p.m. start today.

Notebook: Raleigh said a final decision hadn’t been made on a Sunday starter for UT, but it most likely would be Ty’Relle Harris ... Alabama freshman second baseman Ross Wilson is the younger brother of Alabama’s starting quarterback John Parker Wilson. He was featured in MTV’s mini-series “Two-a-Days” during his football days at Hoover High School.

© 2008, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.