The Virginia baseball team puts its four-game winning streak on the line when it travels to Tallahassee to take on surging No. 6 Florida State in a three-game series beginning Saturday.
The Cavaliers (11-5-1, 2-1 ACC) avenged a four-run ninth inning collapse against Virginia Tech in their ACC opener last Friday by rallying to take the final two games of the series. In a mid-week matchup against Marist, coach Brian O'Connor's young squad overcame a couple of costly errors to outscore the Red Foxes 18-7 during the two-game sweep.
"This has been a fun team to coach because they're like a big sponge," O'Connor said. "They're constantly trying to learn. There's a lot of youth on the ballclub, and there's mistakes that are made, and the only way they get better and learn is by sometimes making those mistakes."
The Cavaliers will need to address their mistakes quickly to continue the team's recent success when they take the diamond against the Seminoles. Florida State entered its Tuesday showdown with No. 1 Florida as the second-hottest team in the country, having won ten straight games. But the Seminoles fell 7-2 to a Gator team which has won a team-record 14 in a row.
"They're very fundamental, they have talented players and so do we. They're well-coached," O'Connor said of Florida State. "Typically they're known for really good pitching and good defense, and they're obviously off to a great start. And I think they have one of the most veteran teams position player-wise that they've had since I've been the coach here."
A pair of veterans anchor a potent Seminoles lineup which averages 7.6 runs per game. Senior outfielder James Ramsey is batting an ACC-best .451 and ranks second in the conference with 25 runs scored. Junior infielder Jayce Boyd is third in the conference with a .415 batting average to go along with 22 RBI.
Florida State has established itself as one of the premier programs in college baseball and has gone 45-19 against the Cavaliers all-time. Florida State has qualified for the NCAA Tournament for 34 consecutive seasons and has the second-highest winning percentage in Division-I history.
Since O'Connor joined Virginia in 2004, however, the Cavaliers have held their own in the series, winning eight of 17 games and defeating the Seminoles in 2009 and 2011 to take home an ACC Tournament title.
"We've fortunately had a lot of success against Florida State over the years," O'Connor said. "It'll be two really good teams that have had a really good rivalry and have played really good baseball games over the last eight years, and this year will be no different."
Virginia took three-of-four from Florida State in 2011, including two consecutive 11-inning walk-off wins in Charlottesville. A home run by senior first baseman Jared King gave the Cavaliers their 13th straight win midway through last season. When the two teams met again for the ACC Championship in June, junior shortstop Chris Taylor's two-run blast helped key a 7-2 victory.
King, Taylor, junior third baseman Stephen Bruno and senior second baseman Keith Werman compose an experienced infield for Virginia, bolstering the confidence of a young Cavalier pitching staff and shielding up-and-coming freshmen outfielders Mike Papi and Derek Fisher.
"Obviously it goes without saying, but it makes it a lot easier to pitch when you've got guys like Chris Taylor, Stephen Bruno, junior infielder Reed Gragnani and Jared King," freshman pitcher Barrett O'Neill said. "You feel confident throwing strikes because you know those guys are going to be positioned ready to make those plays."
At the plate, Gragnani, King and Bruno each bat more than .338 while Taylor leads the team with three home runs.
Veteran talent has eased the transition for a pair of talented young outfielders. Papi announced his emergence as a force in the lineup with a walk-off hit in the Cavaliers' home-opener last month and Fisher did the same with a home run in back-to-back games against Marist, driving in five runs during the series.
"The guys in front of me are on base a lot," Fisher said of the four infielders and Papi, who typically occupy the five spots ahead of him in the batting order. "You can't really complain as a hitter to be hitting with runners on base, so then it's just my job to do what I can do."
The three-game series, which begins Saturday 8 p.m. and will be televised on ESPNU, will be the Cavaliers' first clash with a ranked opponent and gives the team a chance to gauge where it stands in one of college baseball's premier conferences.
"Florida State is an exciting place to play," O'Connor said. "It's one of the storied college baseball programs in this country. They'll have six or seven thousand people and the fact that all three of the games are on television is exciting"
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