This Friday and Saturday, the Virginia baseball team concluded its regular-season and ACC schedules with a three-game series against ACC adversary Wake Forest in Winston-Salem, N.C. The top-ranked Cavaliers (43-11, 22-8 ACC) split a Friday doubleheader and fell by a run in a down-to-the wire Saturday finale, suffering their first losing weekend of 2014.
Wake Forest (30-25, 15-15 ACC) came back from a three-run deficit in the ninth inning of Friday’s opener, winning the game an inning later when senior shortstop Conor Keniry singled against junior closer Nick Howard with the bases loaded for a 6-5 final score.
The Demon Deacons scored a combined four runs against Howard and redshirt senior right-hander Whit Mayberry, the lockdown duo at the back end of the Virginia bullpen.
Sophomore left-hander Nathan Kirby turned in his 12th quality start in 13 tries, striking out seven and walking two before departing with one out in the bottom of the eighth and his team up 5-2.
The Cavaliers answered by scoring the first seven runs and eventually racking up 17 hits—their highest total in 2014 conference play—in Friday night’s 7-2 win. After trading zeroes with Wake Forest for five innings, Virginia scored two runs in the sixth and five more in the seventh to back senior right-hander Artie Lewicki, who tossed seven scoreless in his first ACC start since May 19, 2012.
Sophomore catcher Robbie Coman was at the forefront of the Virginia attack, finishing with three hits in four at bats, including a two-run triple in the Cavaliers’ game-changing seventh.
Saturday, Wake Forest knocked out sophomore left-hander Brandon Waddell with one out in the sixth and base runners on second and third. Freshman third baseman Will Craig singled on the first pitch he saw from freshman right-hander Connor Jones to score both runners and break a 1-1 tie.
Howard stepped to the plate with the bases loaded and Virginia trailing 4-3 with two outs in the top of the ninth. He swung through freshman right-hander Parker Dunshee’s 2-2 offering to end the game.
Junior first baseman Mike Papi hit his conference-best 10th home run in the seventh inning.
The Cavaliers finished second in the ACC’s Coastal Division and earned the No. 3 seed in next week’s ACC Baseball Championship, which runs May 20-25 in Greensboro, N.C. Virginia will play Maryland, No. 4 Florida State and the winner of NC State-North Carolina in first-round pool play.
Virginia-Maryland, the Cavaliers’ first game of the tournament, is scheduled for 11 a.m. Thursday.
As part of Pool B, Virginia would meet the winner of Pool A in Sunday’s championship game. Pool A includes No. 12 Miami, Duke, Clemson and the winner of a play-in game between Wake Forest and Georgia Tech.
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