Virginia drops series with GT

By Jay Jenkins

Published: May 17, 2008

The timing was completely off. The irony was eerily appropriate.

As fans filed out of Davenport Field on Saturday, a song written by AC/DC describing a road trip to Satan’s home blasted through the stadium’s speakers.

For now, however, Virginia’s baseball team sits clearly in postseason purgatory after completing the regular season by dropping the rubber game of the three-game series with No. 25 Georgia Tech, 9-7.

The Yellow Jackets (38-17, 16-14 ACC) dominated the middle-third of the game, slapped out 16 total hits and held off a late rally to secure the No. 5 seed in this week’s ACC Tournament. UVa

(36-19, 15-15) was relegated to the No. 6 seed and will face No. 2 Florida State, No. 3 North Carolina and No. 7 Wake Forest in pool play in Jacksonville, Fla.

“As we saw, Georgia Tech has a very good offensive ballclub and they took advantage of the opportunities we gave them, they crept out there to a pretty big lead and it was a lot to overcome,” said UVa coach Brian O’Connor. “I like the fight in our players to score four runs late, but we have to pitch better to have a chance to win this late in the season.”

Virginia starter Jacob Thompson, the school’s all-time wins leader, minimized early damage after being staked to a 2-0 lead in the first inning, but ran into a game-changing mess in the fifth inning after the Yellow Jackets had evened the score.

Georgia Tech’s Charlie Blackmon opened the frame with a leadoff single to center, took second on a fielding error and advanced to third on a wild pitch. After Thompson recorded his eighth and final strikeout, the junior right-hander walked Luke Murton on a full-count pitch.

With left-handed hitter Derek Dietrich coming up, O’Connor played the percentages and walked to the mound and took the ball from Thompson.

“Dietrich struck out in his first at-bat against him, but he hit a ball really hard in his second at-bat and Jacob was at about 90 pitches,” O’Connor said, “and I felt like if we were going to use Davis, that was the point in the ballgame to do it.”

Davis was shelled — the southpaw gave up four straight hits, allowed two both inherited runners to score and did not retire a batter.

“Neal just didn’t have his good stuff,” O’Connor said, “and he had a tough time getting them out.”

After Georgia Tech scored another run in the sixth against Virginia’s bullpen to go ahead 7-2, the Cavaliers’ offense attempted a rally and scored in the sixth, seventh and ninth innings.

But the Yellow Jackets padded their lead in the seventh with two runs off reliever Jeff Lorick, and Virginia hit into improbable double plays in the seventh and eighth innings.

The first double play, a rocketed line drive by junior David Adams to second base, came in what still managed to become a three-run frame.

“Part of me was like, ‘Heck yeah, I hit one hard,’” said Adams, who has not had a hit in six games. “But part of me was disappointed. I was not disappointed in myself but for the team. I let the team down.”

The play itself, as well as the baserunning blunder in the eighth when catcher Franco Valdes was doubled off first on a blooper that sailed into right field, summed up Virginia’s fortunes during its last nine league games, seven of which it has lost. 

“When you are fighting from behind, those things can’t happen,” O’Connor said. “We typically run the bases very well, and those are a couple of mistakes in a ballgame that you need runs.”

Virginia’s final attempt at a rally produced a run on an RBI double from Jeremy Farrell in the ninth, but ended a batter later on a deep fly off the bat off Dan Grovatt that came 10 feet shy of tying the game.

For the game, Virginia had five doubles and 13 total hits in its second straight game with offensive production.

“Really, I felt like our approach was the best that it has been in about three weeks,” O’Connor said. “I think that is encouraging.”

While the ACC will not officially announce the schedule for the ACC Tournament until 3 p.m. today, multiple sources confirmed that Virginia would face North Carolina on Wednesday at the Baseball Grounds of Jacksonville.

“It really doesn’t matter who we are going to play down there,” O’Connor said. “All I care about is the game we have on Wednesday. If we go out and play hard and fight like we did today and we get a good pitched ballgame, we will have a chance to win.”