OMAHA, Neb. -- For the Texas A&M baseball program, a dozen years was too long and three days was too short.
The Aggies went 12 years between trips to the College World Series. When they got back, it took just two games and less than 72 hours before they were left only with thoughts of what could have been and what's ahead.
The Aggies' most successful season since 1999 ended Tuesday with a 7-3 loss to California in a CWS elimination game at TD Ameritrade Park.
"I told them take a look around here, we're expected to be back," A&M coach Rob Childress said. "I'm sorry that you didn't play better, not for me, not for the other coaches, but for you guys that don't get to stay longer and experience this."
The Aggies (47-22) followed up their heart-breaking, ninth-inning 5-4 loss to defending national champion South Carolina on Sunday with an uncharacteristic showing for them. A&M committed two errors and a third costly defensive mishap while failing offensively to string together hits or put any pressure on the Golden Bears (38-22) with its running game.
"I'm not disappointed in anybody," Childress said. "I'm disappointed for our guys. There's not a guy in the dugout that doesn't wish we had played better collectively, but credit goes to South Carolina and California."
A&M took a 1-0 lead when Adam Smith hit just the third home run of the CWS, a two-out, solo homer that hit the Virginia Cavalier logo at the back of the A&M bullpen in left field. It was Smith's seventh homer of the season.
But a Smith error at third base cracked open the door for the Cinderella Golden Bears, the lone team at the CWS that wasn't a top seed at their regional.
Smith fielded Chad Bunting's hard-hit grounder but lost the ball momentarily and had to hurry a throw that ended up being to tall for Jacob House at first base. Darrel Matthews, batting eighth, then singled, and Derek Campbell followed with a hard-hit ball just to the right of center fielder Krey Bratsen, who had trouble picking it up cleanly, allowing the go-ahead run to score.
One out later, the normally accurate Tyler Naquin threw the ball over catcher Kevin Gonzalez from right field as Campbell scored on Tony Renda's short fly ball.
"I wasn't pumped," said Naquin, who threw out seven baserunners this season. "It just rose out of my hand a little bit. That should be routine for me. I've made a lot harder throws than that. I was [surprised Cambell tagged up], but I was throwing it anyway just to make sure because I'm not going to take a chance."
Campbell took a chance in running, but his run gave Cal a 3-1 lead.
"In the back of my head I'll be honest with you, I was remembering in pregame coaches saying this guy's got a gun," Campbell said. "So I'm just running as fast as I can and didn't think twice about it, trusting my coach."
All three runs were unearned, making it five of eight runs surrendered by A&M to that point in the CWS unearned.
"If we had made a better play in other spots, that throw is not that big a deal, but it was at that time," Childress said. "It would have been a big momentum shift for us to get off the field that way."
Cal scored its next three runs with no extra help.
Marcus Semien led off the sixth inning with a single and scored one out later on Mitch Delfino's double. Bunting looped a single into left field to drive in Delfino, and after a ground out moved Bunting to second, Campbell knocked in his second run of the game. It was only the seventh RBI of the season for the junior, who has hit .438 in the postseason since Renda strained a calf muscle.
"I thought too many of the guys weren't staying with the plan of what got us here," said Cal coach David Esquer, who pulled his team together for a short meeting in the dugout after the fourth inning. "I told them basically I'll take bad contact to the middle of the diamond rather than you trying to make something good happen up against the fence."
The strategy worked again in the seventh with Wacha wearing down and rain falling.
Renda led off with a single and moved to third on a sacrifice and a groundout. Devon Rodriguez, who had Cal's game-winning, two-run single in the ninth against Baylor in the regional finale, stroked a single to left to knock in Renda and knock out Wacha.
"We beat one heck of a team today and one heck of a pitcher," said Esquer, whose team broke a six-game losing streak in the CWS. "If [Wacha] isn't going to be at the top of the draft list next year, I'm missing something."
Wacha (9-4) gave up seven runs (four earned) on nine hits and two walks with five strikeouts. The four earned runs were more than the 6-foot-6 right-hander had given up in his four previous postseason starts combined.
The Aggies cut Cal's lead to 6-3 in the bottom of the sixth, but for the second straight game they didn't get a runner past first in the final three innings.
"We've seen us do it before," Smith said of a potential rally. "We've come back from a lot more than four runs before, but today we just couldn't get it to click."
Bratsen reached on an infield single and Smith on a fielder's choice in the sixth. Bratsen scored when Campbell's throw to first on a double-play attempt sailed wide. Smith scored on Brandon Wood's single up the middle. It was Wood's fifth straight game with an RBI and ninth total over that span.
Gonzalez -- who played in his 236th game as an Aggie, second most ever to Scott Livingston -- had three of the Aggies' 10 hits, nine of which were singles. Four of the hits came with two outs and nobody on base.
"It's hard not getting the leadoff guy on because we can't do our small ball, our bunt game, stuff like that, and it makes it a lot tougher for us," Bratsen said. "We just didn't play to the level that we can today."
The Aggies fell to 2-10 all-time at the CWS. Their last win came in 1993.
A&M won a share of the Big 12 regular season title and won the Big 12 tournament title. The Aggies won an NCAA regional for the first time in three years and a super regional for the first time in Childress' six years at A&M.
"It was a great experience here," Childress said. "I wish we could have stayed longer, but I'm very proud of the seniors that led us here."
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NOTES -- Smith's home run broke a string of 11 scoreless innings for the Aggies and tied him with Matt Juengel at seven for the team lead. He hit three homers in the postseason.. ... Senior Nick Fleece pitched a perfect ninth inning in his A&M single-season record 36th appearance. ... The two errors against Cal cost the 2011 Aggies from having their best fielding percentage ever. Their .9753 mark was 1/1000 below the 2005 team. ... Esquer was named the NCBWA coach of the year on Tuesday. The program was disbanded in September and was reinstated after $10 million was raised. The official word on Cal keeping its program for 2012 was made Friday.
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