OMAHA — Kumar Rocker arrived on Vanderbilt’s campus last fall as one of the most heralded freshman pitching recruits in the country. A tall, strapping right-hander, Rocker relied heavily on a fastball and a looping breaking pitch that dropped straight down.

The Vanderbilt pitching coach, Scott Brown, thought Rocker needed another breaking pitch, one with sharper, more diagonal movement. For decades, there was only one way to teach a new pitch to a player like Rocker: A coach demonstrated a grip and release, and then waited weeks, months, maybe even a season or longer for the player to master it.

But Vanderbilt is among the programs at the forefront of the technological revolution that has trickled down to the college level from Major League Baseball. It is one of at least four college programs with a pitching lab, stocked with the same technology the big leaguers use: Rapsodo pitch-tracking devices and Edgertronic high-speed video cameras.

By spring ball, Rocker had developed a breaking pitch that darts down and away from right-handed batters but looks like his other pitches when leaving his hand. This month Rocker struck out 19 batters — many on breaking pitches — while no-hitting Duke in the N.C.A.A. Super Regionals, the eighth no-hitter in N.C.A.A. Tournament play and the first by a Commodores pitcher since 1971.