The Virginia baseball team wrapped up its regular season home schedule with a 12-3 victory against VCU on Tuesday night. The Cavaliers bats cranked out 14 hits while the Hoo pitchers didn’t walk a single batter. It was a strong showing for UVa, which has won five straight games after its exam break.
The coaching staff has made some small adjustments this month with an eye on the postseason. The moves include line-up changes like shifting Mike Papi to the top of the batting order. He opened the order at Old Dominion and has remained at the top of line-up in the games since. The offense seems to be percolating with the final regular season series scheduled at Wake Forest this weekend.
“It’s nice. Every time Papi is up, everybody thinks he’s going to get a hit or a walk. We have a lot of confidence having him at the plate,” said John La Prise, who went 3 for 4 against VCU. “He sees a lot of pitches so it’s good for everybody else so we see what the guy has that day. It just seems like he’s always on base. … It just feels like the line-up moves real fast and it’s nice having him up there.”
UVa coach Brian O’Connor and his coaches have decided to make a pitching change as well. Josh Sborz, who had been the Saturday starter, will come out of the bullpen this weekend at Wake Forest. He’ll be available from the pen beginning on Friday. That moves Artie Lewicki into the starting rotation and he will get the ball on Thursday night for the series opener. Nathan Kirby is slated to start on Friday with Brandon Waddell in line for Saturday.
The shift begins to set up the postseason plans for the pitchers. The program typically makes this type of adjustment heading into the season’s final stretch. O’Connor said this will allow Kirby to stay on his regular rest pattern, while also getting Sborz aligned for an ACC Tournament start.
“Josh Sborz will be in the bullpen,” O’Connor said. “It has zero to do with Josh Sborz and Artie Lewicki – it’s not a competition between the two of them. It’s hard to have pitched better than Josh Sborz pitched on this last Saturday. He left the game after giving up two hits and, I believe, one run. But we always do this this time of the year and tweak things a little bit. It has more to do with how you want to line things up for the ACC Tournament and beyond then. This allows us to give Nathan Kirby a full week’s rest and plug Artie into that game one.”
Mike Scott’s Big Year
Former Virginia basketball star Mike Scott put together a solid season with the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks, who tested the Indiana Pacers in the first round of the playoffs. Scott made all five of his 3-point attempts in Game 5 against the Pacers when he scored 17 points.
“Perhaps no player on the Hawks took a bigger step forward this season than second-year man Mike Scott,” Robby Kalland of the Hawks’ official site writes in this article. That piece also addresses what some of Scott’s improvement areas needed to be as he tried to stick in the league – defense and defending perimeter players in particular as well as expanding his shooting range. Scott made strides in those areas and is expected to pick up a second NBA contract as his rookie deal expires this season.
More Links
- Some ACC schools may schedule each other as “non conference” football games, ESPN reports here.
- The Baltimore Ravens drafted Brent Urban, which could impact Chris Canty according to this ESPN article.
- Michigan State’s Adreian Payne helped disappoint Virginia fans in the Sweet 16, but his friendship with Lacey Holsworth touched many people’s hearts. Holsworth died after a long battle with cancer shortly after basketball season ended. ESPN’s Dick Vitale is raising money in Holsworth’s name for a pediatric cancer research grant. Read more here.
- In this Vine Video link, Joe Harris said he models his game on Golden State’s Klay Thompson, who played for Tony Bennett at Washington State.
- Mike Tobey visited a local school team near his home in Monroe, New York this week and it created some smiles for the youngsters. Click here for more.
Tweet of the Day
https://twitter.com/UVABaseball/status/466375391343837184
Hoo-Tube Video of the Day
With the Virginia baseball team setting up its pitching rotation for the upcoming postseason as well as a lot of message board discussion recently about pitching at the youth level, this older video with Cavalier pitching coach Karl Kuhn is a good resource.
