UNC loses first to BC, play again today
Alex White (TarHeelBlue.com)
It was definitely not the way that head coach Mike Fox had envisioned the last series for the season would begin. After being 9-0 against the Eagles 4th ranked North Carolina (39-14, 17-10 in the ACC) went to Chestnut Hill and lost to Boston College (31-21, 13-13 in the ACC) for the first time since they moved to the Atlantic Coast Conference. And this is the type of game that no coach would want to see, as the Tar Heels commit three errors and left a dozen players on the base path. In the end all of that made it be that BC took the game 3-1 from UNC, and now we wait until today to see if Carolina can right the ship or not. For a very good recap by someone who knows the game and was at the game, check out the The College Baseball Blog.
One person that can not take the blame in this game, but has to take the loss for Carolina is All-American pitcher Alex White (7-3), who threw seven good innings, giving up three runs (1 earned) on six hits and a walk, while striking out six. In all the junior right hander threw 121 pitches (83 strikes), while having one wild pitch in the game and hitting a batter as well. And while you might think that those numbers aren’t all that good, the reality is that when you leave 12 base runners stranded losing 3-1 gives the pitcher a pass in my opinion.
On the offensive side the Heels had 10 hits in all, six coming from Ben Bunting (lf), Levi Michael (2B) and Garrett Gore (rf), while All American Dustin Ackley (1B) did get a hit (1 for 5) but left five men on bases, and that just can’t happen when you are an A-A caliber player going towards the post season, Ackley also had an error in the game. The third/fourth/fifth batter for UNC went 3 for 14, with no walks and four strike outs, again numbers that you can not have if you want to have a fruitful ACC and NCAA Tournament.
From what I read on TarHeelBlue nothing much happened during the first four innings of the game, but UNC loaded up the bases with just one out in the fifth, but could not get any runs across as the BC pitcher got the next two Heels batters to fly out. In the bottom of the same frame Boston College scored its first run, thanks in part to two errors by the Tar Heels. This seemed to have awoken Carolina as Mike Fox’ club scored in the next inning, when a Heel got on base with a single, moved over to second on a balk and came home thanks to another single. This puts the game at one a piece.
But the game would not stay tied for long as the Eagles scored in the bottom of the sixth, as a single by a BC batter, who then move to second thanks to a wild pitch, was then brought home by a sacrifice fly. The Heels seemed ready to get that run back (or more) when in the next inning they had runners on first and third and just one out, but a strike out and a great defensive play by a BC infielder killed this rally. The third, and finally, run by Boston College came with a single that then moved to second on a ground out and then to the corner thanks to another wild pitch, and finally across home plate on a sacrifice fly ball.
The team will try to even the series at one a piece when they play again this afternoon. The series will end tomorrow as the Heels and the Eagles will once again face off with the first pitch being at 1:00 p.m. EST.
