No. 21 Virginia Hosts Louisville in Final ACC Home Series

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – No. 21 Virginia (38-11, 13-11 ACC) will host a three-game conference series against Louisville (29-19, 9-15 ACC) beginning Friday (May 12) with the series opener at 6 p.m. The middle game is scheduled to air on ACC Network at 4 p.m. on Saturday and the series concludes on Sunday at 1 p.m.

HOW TO FOLLOW
TV: ACCNX (Fri. & Sun.) | ACC Network (Sat.)
RADIO: WINA (98.9 FM/1070 AM/WINA.com) – Fri. & Sun. only
LIVE STATS: VirginiaSports.com

HEROES APPRECIATION WEEKEND
FRIDAY: Military Appreciation – Pregame flyover, red, white & Hoo decal giveaway, discounted tickets for retired & active duty military.
SATURDAY: First Responders Appreciation – Police, Fire & EMT vehicles on site to explore, discounted tickets-First responders, chance to win (2) free round trip tickets from CHO to Orlando with Avelo Airlines & More
SUNDAY: Youth Day, Senior Day, Mother’s Day – Arrive early to celebrate UVA baseball seniors, inflatables, balloon artist, face painting, poster giveaway & more, postgame autographs, kids run the bases.

 

WEEKEND PARKING
Friday: An event at John Paul Jones Arena will increase traffic around the athletic precinct but all JPJ lots are open and free for baseball patrons. In addition, Emmet/Ivy Garage is an option for baseball fans and shuttle will run from EIG to Klöckner Ticket Booth before and after the game.
Saturday: Due to an event at JPJ on Saturday night free parking for baseball fans will be available only in Emmet/Ivy Garage. A shuttle will run from EIG to Klöckner Ticket Booth before and after the game.

Emmet/Ivy Garage Info: https://parking.virginia.edu/emmetivy-parking-garage

PROBABLE PITCHING MATCHUP
Friday – 6 p.m.
Louisville: RHP Ryan Hawks (5-2, 3.93 ERA, 68.2, 19 BB, 76 SO)
Virginia: RHP Nick Parker (4-0, 4.53 ERA, 43.2 IP, 15 BB, 58 SO)

Saturday – 4 p.m.
Louisville: RHP Carson Liggett (7-0, 2.31 ERA, 62.1 IP, 24 BB, 56 SO)
Virginia: LHP Connelly Early (9-1, 2.83 ERA, 54.0 IP, 14 BB, 64 SO)

Sunday – 1 p.m.
Louisville: TBA
Virginia: TBA

LEADING OFF

• Since 2009, Virginia has a 48-25 record against ACC foes coming out of exam break. The Cavaliers have won 14-straight home series after breaking for exams.
• The Cavaliers will close out an 11-game homestand this weekend, the longest of the season. UVA is 6-2 in its last eight games at home.
• Virginia enters the weekend with 38 wins, tied with LSU for the second-most in college baseball. The Cavaliers are two-wins behind consensus No. 1 Wake Forest.
• UVA is seeking its first 40-win season since 2017 and 12th under head coach Brian O’Connor.
• Virginia comes into the weekend as the national leader in hits (584) and doubles (136). The team batting average of .335 is the second highest in the country.
• UVA is the only team in the country to rank in the top-10 in BOTH batting average (2nd – .335) and ERA (9th – 3.86).

NON-CONFERENCE DOMINANCE

• Virginia went 25-0 this season against non-conference opponents and has won 29-straight regular season games against non-conference foes dating back to last year.
• The Cavaliers finished unblemished in non-conference play for the first time in program history and are the first DI team without a non-conference loss since 2015.
• Only three NCAA teams since 2010 have finished the regular season without a non-conference loss – Virginia (2023 – 25-0), Texas A&M (2015 – 25-0) and Arizona State (2010 – 24-0).
• Virginia is the only team in the country this season without a non-conference loss. Wake Forest, NC State and Northeastern are the next closest, all with two non-league losses.
• UVA outscored non-conference foes, 287-77 and held a team batting average of .369.
• Cavalier arms produced five shutouts in non-ACC action and pitched to a 2.48 ERA in 221 innings.

NO PLACE LIKE HOME

• Virginia boasts a 29-4 mark at home this season and has the second most home wins in the country behind Tennessee (30).
• UVA has won 25 or more games at home 14 of the 20 seasons under head coach Brian O’Connor.
• Virginia has matched its home win total posted last season and haven’t won 30 games at home since 2013.
• The Cavaliers have won 25 or more home games in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 2013 and 2014. UVA won 25 or more games at Disharoon Park in each of Brian O’Connor’s first 11 seasons, including a school record, 35 twice first in 2011 and again 2013.
• The Cavaliers have won over 77 percent of their games (566-169) at Disharoon Park since the facility opened in 2002.
• UVA is amid an 11-game homestand, the longest stint at home this season. After returning home from Notre Dame, UVA will not leave the Commonwealth for 23 days until its final road series of the regular season against Georgia Tech (May 18-20).

AGAINST LOUISVILLE

• Over the last eight meetings against Louisville, the two teams have each won four games. All but two of those games have been decided by three or less runs.
• Louisville has a 13-9 advantage in the all-time series that first began when the Cardinals entered the league in 2015.
• The last series win over Louisville came in 2019 at Disharoon Park when the Cavaliers took the final two games of the series by a combined score of 22-8.
• One of the most exciting games in recent memory against Louisville was a 10th-inning walk-off winner in the series opener of the 2019 series at Disharoon Park. Devin Ortiz tied the game with a home run in the ninth and Logan Michaels came around to score the winning run on a Louisville fielding error.

ON RECORD WATCH

• Ethan Anderson is one double away from matching the school single season record of 23 held by Stephen Bruno (2012) and Dan Street (2002). Kyle Teel (21) and Jake Gelof (20) are all within striking distance entering the weekend.
• Gelof has two of the three 75+ RBI seasons in school history. He’s six RBI shy of matching his own single season mark set last year and three shy of passing Pavin Smith’s 2017 total of 77.
• Gelof hit his 19th home run of the season on Wednesday against Radford, moving into sole possession of third place on UVA’s single season home run mark. Brian Buchanan owns the school mark of 22 set in 1994. Gelof is looking for his second-straight 20-homer season after blasting 21 last year.
• With one more run scored, Griff O’Ferrall can become the 13th player in UVA history to score 60 runs in a season.

SEEING DOUBLE

• Virginia leads the country with 136 doubles, 10 more than any other team in the country.
• Ethan Anderson’s 22 doubles are the most in the ACC and tied for the fourth most in the country.
• For the first time in program history, the Cavaliers have three players with 20 or more doubles in a year – Anderson (22), Kyle Teel (21) and Jake Gelof (20).
• UVA has five players with 15 or more doubles, all ranking in the top-eight in the ACC.

ON THE MOUND

• A graduate transfer from Coastal Carolina, Nick Parker will make his final regular season start at Disharoon Park on Friday night. Parker has 50 collegiate starts under his belt, tied for the second-most among active NCAA pitchers.
• The righthander is coming off his best game as a Cavalier, fanning a career-high 12 batters over 6.2 innings against then-No. 20 Duke on April 29. Parker improved to 4-0 on the season and UVA is 8-2 in games which he starts.
• The 12 strikeouts were the most by a Cavalier pitcher in 2023 and the most since Brandon Neeck struck out 16 in the 2021 NCAA Columbia Regional.
• Connelly Early will make his second start of the week and 13th start of the season on Saturday. The lefthander threw 20 pitchers, faced four batters before giving way to Jack O’Connor on Wednesday against Radford.
• Early slides into the weekend rotation for the second time this season. After an injury to Parker against Florida State, Early was slotted into the middle game against Virginia Tech.
• The lefthander notched his 20th career victory in his outing against JMU last Wednesday. He is one of 16 active NCAA pitchers with 20 or more wins and his 20 wins tied for 8th most among active NCAA pitchers.
• Early tossed six shutout innings against JMU on May 3 and produced his fourth quality start, tied with Brian Edgington for the most on the staff.
• Early is looking to become the 12th UVA pitcher ever to record 10 wins in a season and the first since Connor Jones recorded 11 in 2016.
• Going into the weekend, Early trails only Rhett Lowder (10) for the ACC lead in wins. Lowder is one of four pitchers with an NCAA-best, 10 wins.
• Early ranks in the top-10 in the ACC in WHIP (5th – 1.07), strikeout-to-walk ratio (6th – 4.57), ERA (7th – 2.83) and hits allowed per nine innings (8th – 7.33).
• The Cavalier pitching staff boasts the eighth-lowest team ERA (3.86) in the country and third-lowest in the ACC.
• Of the 497 strikeouts (11th most in NCAA) recorded by Cavalier pitching, 162 have come looking, the second-most in the country.
• UVA is looking for its third-straight 500-strikeout season under pitching coach Drew Dickinson. The Cavaliers broke the school record with 687 in 2021 and struck out 598 batters last season, the third-most in program history.
• The Cavalier hurlers also boast college baseball’s 6th-best strikeout-to-walk ratio (3.15) and rank 12th in walks allowed per nine innings (3.29).

POTENT ATTACK

• The Cavaliers have scored 445 runs this season the seventh-most of any team in the nation and are averaging 9.1 runs per game, the ninth-most in the country.
• There are 30 players in D-I baseball batting over the .400 mark, two of them are in the Cavalier lineup – Kyle Teel (.416) and Griff O’Ferrall (.405). UVA is one of three schools with multiple players batting .400 (Omaha – 2, Sam Houston – 2).
• Virginia has struck out 310 times as a team this season, the fewest of any team in the ACC.
• Virginia has the fourth largest scoring/run differential in the country.

 Highest DI Scoring Margin/Run Differential

1.	Wake Forest	+6.3
2	LSU	+5.0
3.	Campbell	+4.9
4.	Virginia	+4.7
5.	South Carolina	+4.2

 PLAYER NOTABLES

• Kyle Teel, who has started the last 107 games at catcher for UVA, is sixth in the country in hits (82). He leads the ACC in batting average (.416), hits and hits per game (1.67).
• Teel needs six more hits to crack the top-10 on UVA’s single season hits lists. He’s the 31st Cavalier to record 80 hits in a season.
• Ethan O’Donnell is hitting .475 (9-for-19) with a home run, eight runs scored and six RBI in his last five games. Against JMU he recorded his third, four-hit game of the season going 4-for-5 and added a career-high two stolen bases.
• Casey Saucke has reached base 13-straight games, the longest active streak on the team. The sophomore is batting .391 (18-for-46) in that span.
• Virginia has four of the top-8 ACC hits leaders in its lineup – Teel (1st – 82), O’Ferrall (2nd – 79), Anderson (4th – 77) and O’Donnell (8th – 71).