Tuesday, February 22

Today, we were supposed to play Georgia State at Panthersville Stadium, but due to weather conditions from the previous days, they postponed the game until Wednesday. We were really looking forward to this redemption match-up against them since they upset us in our home opener. But hopefully for us, this was the wake-up call we needed to get us going in the right direction.

Wednesday, February 23

at Georgia State – Won 11-6

There would be no rainout today fortunately, and we were able to get our redemption as well.

Both teams were scoreless after two innings, but in the third, we opened up the arsenal and started to mount an offensive attack. Steven Blackwood had his typical day, coming up with the bases loaded in back-to-back innings and driving in runs. Over his three-year career, he has always been a clutch hitter with men in scoring position and just continues to find a way to get the job done.

Ryan Turner got the win in his shutout performance through five innings.

We were up 11-0 going into the bottom of the eighth when we had a defensive meltdown and gave up six runs on four errors. Although we won the game and got some redemption, it would have been much nicer to finish the shutout with an exclamation mark.

But when all is said and done, “a win is a win” no matter how you look at it.

Friday February 25

Rutgers – Won 11-6

Jason Neighborgall came out and had a shaky first inning. He hit the leadoff batter, struck out the second batter, hit the third batter, struck out the fourth batter and Andy Hawranick threw out the runner trying to steal third for a double play. After that, Jason found his groove and started mowing their hitters down. The way he is throwing right now, he gives us a great chance to win the opening game of every series.

Wes Hodges supplied the offensive power in this game, hitting a double in his first at-bat, and two absolute bombs in his second and third at-bats. Although we gave up some runs late in the game, it was a fairly easy victory.

Saturday February 26

Rutgers – Lost 10-9 in 13 innings

The beginning of this game had all the makings of a blowout, but we just couldn’t seem to finish the job.

Lee Hyde came out firing with a quick first two innings, and our offense jumped out to a 6-0 lead after two innings.

Despite giving up one run in the top of the third, we immediately put runners on first and second with nobody out and for the first time, failed to score.

Then the wheels fell off in the top of the fourth when we gave up five runs to even the score at 6-6.

Tyler Greene answered the bell immediately for us, hitting a double on the first pitch in the bottom half. Then Steven Blackwood drove him home with an opposite-field home run. This was a big motivation swing for us to answer after Rutgers had scored five in the top half of the inning.

With the score now 8-6, Rutgers would eventually tie the score up before we went ahead 9-8 with a chance to put a nail in the coffin with the bases loaded and one out. We blew the opportunity and hit into a double play to end the inning.

Still with the lead, we gave up a solo home run in the top of the ninth to tie the score at 9.

Although we had a plenty of opportunities to score throughout the rest of the game, we just couldn’t seem to get the job done and messed up a bunt play on the defensive side to give up the winning run. Despite doing so many great things offensively, we still had plenty of mistakes by not doing the little things that would have sealed the victory for us.

Despite the loss, I still need to give a shout out to Wes Hodges’ 5-for-7 performance with another massive bomb off the scoreboard in Death Valley (left-center field).

Sunday February 27

Rainout

This was the worst possible thing that could have happened to us. After blowing the game on Saturday, we wanted nothing more than to at least get some revenge and win the series. But that just didn’t seem to be in the cards for us as it continued to rain throughout the day. Although we didn’t get to play, we got some good work done in the cages.  

Coming up…

Georgia Southern on Tuesday

Atlanta Braves on Wednesday

At Duke Friday through Sunday