Virginia’s Season Ends at Greenville Regional

GREENVILLE, N.C. – Coastal Carolina (38-19-1) overcame a 6-0 deficit and walked off with a 7-6 victory to eliminate Virginia (39-19) from the Greenville Regional on Sunday (June 5). The Chanticleers advanced to play host East Carolina in the regional championship on Sunday night.

Coastal’s Austin White led the bottom of ninth inning off with a single up the middle and was sacrificed over by Eric Brown. After an intentional walk put runners on first and second, Chris Rowan Jr. drove in the game-winning run with a single into center field.

Sophomore Jake Gelof matched the UVA single game NCAA Tournament records for RBI (5), and home runs (2) He also eclipsed UVA’s single-season RBI record with his first home run of the day. Gelof was 2-for-3 with two home runs and five RBI in the contest.

Graduate transfer Alex Tappen went 4-for-5 with two runs scored and an RBI in his final game as a Cavalier. The four-hit effort was his second in the last seven games and fourth of the season.

HOW IT HAPPENED

• Virginia needed just three batters to come to the plate in the first to get on the scoreboard. Kyle Teel, the second batter of the game doubled and then came around to score on a Tappen RBI single to right field. The RBI was Tappen’s 71^st of the season.
• Gelof hit his first home run of the game in the third inning, a two-run shot into the trees in left field to put UVA up 3-0. He had 76 RBI going into the contest and the long ball broke UVA’s single season RBI record, passing Pavin Smith (77 in 2017).

• After back-to-back singles from Teel and Tappen, Gelof doubled the UVA led with his 21^st home run of the season.

• Coastal Carolina scored the next six runs, three in the fifth and three in the sixth. The Chanticleers drew four walks and a hit by pitch in the fifth inning to cut the UVA lead in half. A leadoff home run by Nick Lucky pulled Coastal within two and a two-run home run by Graham Brown tied the game in the sixth.
• Reliever Matt Wyatt ended a Coastal threat to score in the seventh inning, inducing a 5-4-3 double with the bases loaded.

FROM HEAD COACH BRIAN O’CONNOR

“First and foremost, disappointed with the end of the season. Certainly when it happens this sudden there is a lot of emotion from the player standpoint. That’s because they care about each other, they care about the uniform that they wear and they have a lot of respect for everything that they put into it. We did a great job against their starter (Michael Knorr), a terrific job. We took a 6-0 lead and (Jake) Berry was pitching great and then just couldn’t find it. We had that tough inning but we were able to manage it. Make it 6-3 and they did a great job off (Paul) Kosanovich who has done a terrific job for us all year. Nobody’s swung the bat like that against him this year and they did a great job. He had left a couple of sliders up in the zone and they hit him out to their credit. We had some opportunities late and just couldn’t cash in. That’s the game.

“We did take advantage of those opportunities early. We talk a lot about this game as a game of momentum and part of our responsibility is to manage it when it’s not going your way and. Coastal climbed back in it and had some good momentum in the back half of the game and congratulations to them. They get a chance to move on to the title game.

“I’m just certainly disappointed for our guys, that said when we get a chance to go back and have reflect on the entire season, not just this moment, I know our guys will be very, very proud. I’m really proud that of this team and most importantly, proud of the young men who wear the uniform and how they represent our program and how they are as people.”

ADDITIONAL NOTES

• Gelof and Pavin Smith are the only two UVA players to hit multiple home runs and drive in five RBI in an NCAA Tournament game. Smith hit two home runs against East Carolina in the 2016 Charlottesville Regional. In 2017, Smith drove in five runs against Dallas Baptist.
• Gelof has five career NCAA Tournament home runs breaking program record held by Pavin Smith (2015-17) and Chris Newell (2021-22)
• The multi-home run game was Gelof’s fifth of the year, establishing a UVA single-season record.
• Tappen finished his career appearing in 218 games, the seventh-most in UVA history.
• Virginia finished 21-3 when scoring in the first inning and 28-5 when scoring first on the year.

Greenville All-Regional Team
C – Kyle Teel (Virginia)
1B – Chris Rowan, Jr. (Coastal Carolina)
2B – Matt McDermott (Coastal Carolina)
SS – Zach Agnos (East Carolina)
3B – Jake Gelof (Virginia)
OF – Bryson Worrell (East Carolina)
OF – Nick Lucky (Coastal Carolina)
OF – Alex Tappen (Virginia)
DH – Jacob Jenkins-Cowart (East Carolina)
P – Nick Parker (Coastal Carolina)
P – Carter Spivey (East Carolina)

MOP – Bryson Worrell (East Carolina)