DURHAM, NC – The top three in the batting order collected seven runs, six hits, and six RBI to pace the Virginia baseball team to an 11-0 win over the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets here at Durham Bulls Park. The Cavaliers advanced to pool play in the ACC Tournament with the play-in win.
UVa starter Josh Sborz was the benefactor of the offensive fireworks as the team took a five-run lead after three innings. But Sborz did some damage of his own too. He carved up the Jacket hitters with eight strikeouts over seven scoreless innings.
Still the Cavalier offense, as it has been since the exam break, was clearly the story again Tuesday.
Since the nine-day layoff, Virginia has averaged six runs per game and is hitting .308. That wasn’t the case the last time Virginia played Georgia Tech. The Hoos lost the series in Atlanta 1-2. After winning the first contest 14-4, Wahoo hitters went 3 of 22 with runners in scoring position (w/RISP). Tuesday, GT coach Danny Hall watched the UVa offense hit 7 for 13 (.538) w/RISP.
“I think probably their hitters are much more confident,” said Hall in his postgame remarks. “I think when we played them in April you could sense that they were struggling a little bit. And now they’re not. They’re pretty confident up and down the order.”
Over the last four games, Virginia is an impressive 20 for 50 w/RISP. That’s a strong .400 average. In the win over Georgia Tech, freshman Adam Haseley went 2 for 3 and scored four runs from his leadoff position in the lineup. Danny Pinero went 2 for 2, including a two-run homer, to tally three runs and four RBI. Matt Thaiss and Pavin Smith both went 2 for 4 with 2 RBI and Kenny Towns added two more RBI.
With postseason play hanging in the balance, Hoo hitters have gotten hot at the right time.
Several factors have contributed to the offensive turnaround after Virginia started the first 45 games of the season hitting .273.
Injuries to key veterans Joe McCarthy, second baseman John La Prise, and catcher Robbie Coman dramatically impacted the offense. La Prise has missed the entire season and McCarthy lost 11 weeks following back surgery (35 games). Coman missed eight games early in the season with a knee injury plus an additional outing when he took a batting practice grounder off the eye. Infielder Ernie Clement missed seven games with a hamstring injury, but returned to the lineup on April 26. Jack Gerstenmaier made his season debut April 15 after undergoing hamstring surgery in late September (missed 35 games), the same day as McCarthy’s return.
It’s taken all of those hitters time to get their timing and hand-eye coordination back in sync but it seems to be happening at the right time for Coach Brian O’Connor.
“It’s been certainly well documented throughout this year the injuries that this team has taken on and they’ve found a way to push through it,” O’Connor said. “And now we’re at the point where we’re as healthy as we ever have been. John La Prise isn’t coming back, but we’re as healthy as we have been, and I think the health and then the consistency leads to the consistency that we’ve been able to play with.”
Another component of Virginia’s offensive surge is that the players that started the season as first-year players have nearly a full season under their belts now. When the season began, it was assumed that freshman would need to make a significant contribution. With the injuries to veteran players and projected rookie starters like Gerstenmaier, more freshmen were asked to take on unexpected roles. It takes time for freshmen to adapt to the many different pitches thrown at the collegiate level as well as the pace of the game in general. O’Connor says that requires an adjustment period.
“You have these rookies that have collected all these at-bats now and they understand what it takes to be successful at this level,” he said. “And so they’re more like veteran players now, and they’re more consistent than maybe they had been up until this point.”
Virginia has put at least four freshmen in 44 of the 52 starting lineups this year, including eight games with five rookies and three contests with six. Clement, Smith, and Charlie Cody all have higher averages now than they did when Virginia played GT in early April. Gerstenmaier is hitting .321 too but wasn’t available for the Atlanta series. Only Haseley has experienced a drop from in batting average from .273 to .261. O’Connor said he expected to see an improvement in the offense as the season continued with improved play from the rookies.
“Starting this season I even felt before the injuries happened, I felt that this team really had a chance to be special at this time of the year, just because I knew we’d be counting on so many first-year players,” O’Connor said. “I knew coming down the stretch run that they would play like veterans now. As the season has progressed, injured players got healthy and rookie players got acclimated to ACC baseball.”
The Hoos not only battled youth and injuries, they also battled Mother Nature. Snow, cold and rain prevented the Hoos from playing their first home game until March 11. Virginia’s offense and pitching got off balance during the early season games, especially the midweek games the Hoos missed because of weather.
Baseball is a game designed to be played frequently. The repetitions and timing that come with playing daily is critical to success at the plate. The Hoos did not play a midweek game until March 11, 13 games into the 2015 campaign. Since that time UVa has managed to play at least one midweek game through the end of the season.
“Certainly the first month-and-a-half of our season, our season and a lot of other college baseball teams’ season, it was kind of scattered,” O’Connor said. “I think the first four weeks of the season we didn’t play a mid-week game, we were only playing on weekends.”
The Hoos lost 16 home games from their schedule due to the weather. In fact, the Hoos have the sixth-most road or neutral site wins in Division I baseball and the most in the ACC. Of teams in traditional warm-weather states, UVa’s 22 wins are the most wins away from home of anyone. Entering the ACC Tournament, Virginia had played seven games in nine days. Consistency in schedule, consistency in lineup (since the first game of the NC State series on April 24, a span of 12 games, the Hoos have had the same batting order 1-7 and the same starting position players in 10 of the 12 outings), and greater consistency from individual players has made for greater consistency at the plate.
“It felt like the last five or six ballgames we’ve really been consistent offensively and we have a very, very good lineup, one through nine,” O’Connor said.
