Virginia Concludes Regular Season at Wake Forest

May 16, 2018

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — Virginia (27-22, 11-16 ACC) will play its final Atlantic Coast Conference series at Wake Forest (23-29, 11-16 ACC) beginning Thursday night (May 17) at 3 p.m. The series continues Friday (May 18) at 6 p.m. and wraps up on Saturday (May 19) with a 1 p.m. first pitch.

Game Coverage: The entire series will air on ACC Network Extra, a dedicated digital channel for ACC sports which is available to authenticated subscribers of ESPN3 through WatchESPN and the ESPN app at no additional charge.

In addition, all three games can be heard locally on 1070 AM / 98.9 AM and on WINA.com. Links for the radio broadcast as well as the game’s live stats feed are available on VirginiaSports.com. Fans can follow in-game updates on the team’s official twitter page (@UVABaseball).

Probable Starting Pitchers

Thursday — 3 p.m.
Virginia: RHP Derek Casey (6-3, 3.27 ERA, 82.2 IP, 21 BB, 93 SO)
Wake Forest: RHP Griffin Roberts (4-4, 3.94 ERA, 82.1 IP, 34 BB, 117 SO)

Friday — 6 p.m.
Virginia: RHP Noah Murdock (1-2, 6.75 ERA, 9.1 IP, 3 BB, 8 SO)
Wake Forest: RHP Morgan McSweeney (2-5, 4.28 ERA, 67.1 IP, 33 BB, 64 SO)

Saturday — 1 p.m.
Virginia: TBA
Wake Forest: RHP Colin Peluse (6-1, 3.86 ERA, 77.0 IP, 24 BB, 57 SO)

Leading Off
– Virginia needs a victory or a Virginia Tech loss or a Pittsburgh win to clinch a berth into the 2018 ACC Championship in Durham.
– Wake Forest and Virginia will square off for the first time since 2016 and the first time since 2014 in Winston-Salem.
– The Cavaliers will go for their fifth ACC series victory of the season with series wins over Boston College, Virginia Tech, Louisville and Georgia Tech in 2018.
– The road game on Thursday night will be the first for Virginia since a 2-1 win at Louisville on April 22.
– Including all three games at Wake Forest, Virginia will conclude the regular season with five games in six days.
– Wake Forest owns an 88-80 advantage in an all-time series that was first played in 1894. Under Brian O’Connor, 21-11 against the Demon Deacons.

Starting Pitchers Rule the Weekend
– Strong performances on the mound by Derek Casey on Friday night and Daniel Lynch on Monday night helped clinch Virginia’s fourth ACC series victory of the season.
– Lynch fanned a career-high 13 batters in Monday night’s series clincher. It marked the fifth time this season he’s posted a double-digit strikeout total this season.
– Casey put forth his eighth quality start of the season in the series opener and was aided by a six-run fifth inning by the Cavalier offense.
– Georgia Tech’s Connor Thomas limited Virginia to an unearned run in the middle game as he tossed his third complete game of the season.

Cavalier Offense
– Virginia posted a six-run fifth inning in the series opener against Georgia Tech, the seventh time the Cavaliers have scored five or more runs in an inning.
– After matching a season-high in ACC play with 13 hits on Friday, Virginia racked up 14 in Monday night’s finale.
– Of the 297 NCAA Division I teams, only Arkansas Pine-Bluff has struck out fewer times (271) than Virginia. Both the Cavaliers and Charlotte are tied for the second fewest team strikeouts with 272.

Player Notes/Trends
– Andy Weber comes into the weekend ranked third in the league in batting average (.347), second in doubles (17) and eighth in RBI (45). In league play, he boasts the ACC’s second highest average (.346) and 27 of his 44 RBI have come against conference opponents.
– In the Georgia Tech series, freshman Tanner Morris went 6-for-11 (.545) with two runs scored and two RBIs. He has hit safely in his last four games, including his second four-hit effort of the season last Friday against Georgia Tech.
– In his last five games, Alex Tappen is 8-for-18 (.444) with three doubles a triple and a home run. He was a double short of the cycle in Monday night’s series finale against Georgia Tech. He plated the first run of Tuesday’s midweek game against Richmond with the first of his two doubles on the night. He owns a team-best, six-game hit streak.
– Justin Novak broke up Connor Thomas’ no hitter in the fifth inning of the middle game against Georgia Tech. He finished with two, multi-hit efforts in the series and has hit safely in five-straight games where he’s 7-for-17.
– After missing the previous 37 games due to injury, junior Jake McCarthy returned to the lineup on Monday night and went 2-for-3 with an RBI. He’s collected three RBIs in his first two game back.

Down to the Wire
– Of Virginia’s 11 weekend series this season, eight have been decided in the final game. The winning team in five of those contests have won by one-run and two have gone to extra innings.
– Virginia is 5-3 in series-deciding games and 3-3 in ACC series-deciding games in 2018.

Noting Wake Forest
– The Demon Deacons have lost eight of their last nine ACC games coming into the weekend. After Georgia Tech took two out of three in Atlanta, Wake Forest dropped all three at then-No. 5 NC State last weekend.
– Friday night’s starting pitcher Griffin Roberts is fifth in the country in strikeouts with 117. He has taken home the ACC Pitcher of the Week award three times this season. The right-hander is 2-3 with a 4.50 ERA in nine ACC starts.
– Wake Forest is coming off one of the best season’s in program history after posting 43 wins and advancing to the Super Regionals in 2017.