GREENSBORO, N.C. – After switching the venues of the games for this weekend from Greensboro to Blacksburg, Va., the UNCG baseball team makes its trek to Virginia Tech (4-0) for a three-game series beginning on Saturday, Feb. 23 at 2 p.m.
The Spartans (3-0) will send redshirt sophomore right-handed pitcher Phillip Sanderson (1-0, 1.50 ERA) to the mound in the series opener to face Ian Seymour (1-0, 0.00 ERA). In Sanderson's last outing, against Quinnipiac in the season opener, he tossed six innings, allowed two hits, two runs, one earned run, two walks and fanned six Bobcat hitters.
Game two, set to take place on Sunday at 12 p.m., will pit UNCG's Jeremiah Triplett (1-0) against the Hokies Luke Scherzer (1-0, 0.00 ERA). Triplett earned his first win of the season for the Spartans in the 8-2 victory over Quinnipiac (Feb. 16), striking out seven Bobcat hitters in the process. He was responsible for only one run on the afternoon.
Freshman Austin Koehn (0-0, 1.93) gets the ball in game three and will face Virginia Tech's Chris Gerard (0-0, 2.25 ERA). Koehn, making the first start of his collegiate career earlier this week at High Point, surrendered just three hits, one walk and two runs (one earned) in 4.2 innings on the mound. He was one of three UNCG hurlers to face the Panthers on Tuesday evening, combining for 16 strikeouts against the Panthers.
KEYS TO THE SERIES
-On Saturday, Feb. 23, in the opening game with Virginia Tech, the Spartans will look to equal their best start (4-0) under head coach Link Jarrett in his seven-year tenure. The last time that UNCG started a season 4-0 under Jarrett came in 2013, when the Spartans downed Army (7-4, 8-5), UNC Asheville (10-9) and Dayton (8-2) before dropping the fifth game of the season to the Flyers by a 3-2 decision. UNCG's second-best start under Jarrett came a season ago, 3-1, after winning two of three against Appalachian State (10-3, 11-6, 4-6) and emerging with a 13-8 win over Oakland.
-UNCG is 2-3 all-time against the Hokies in program history. The two first collided in 1992, under Mike Gaski, with Virginia Tech taking a pair of meetings 14-3 (Feb. 29) and 12-6 (March 1) in Greensboro. Less than two weeks later, while taking part in a tournament at Georgia Southern, the two teams met again with the Spartans emerging 10-7 on March 13. The following afternoon, Virginia Tech avenged that setback with a 12-3 win. They last met on March 21, 1993, in Blacksburg,
where the Spartans posted a 7-5 victory.
-Austin Embler, who has a team-best six hits on the season, owns the top batting average (.545) on the team heading into the weekend. Two of Embler's hits have gone for extra bases (double, home run) on the season and the redshirt senior has scored four of UNCG's 26 runs. He has a .909 slugging percentage and a .667 on-base percentage. There are three Spartans hitting at least .400 or better, including Caleb Webster (.455; 5-for-11) and Hogan Windish (.429; 3-for-7). The Spartans have four pitchers with less than a 4.00 ERA, including Jeremiah Triplett (1.35 ERA, 1-0), Phillip Sanderson (1.50 ERA, 1-0), Austin Koehn (1.93 ERA, 0-0) and Corey Jackson (2.70 ERA, 1-0).
-Virginia Tech enters the weekend with a perfect 4-0 mark in 2019, averaging eight runs per contest. The Hokies started the season with a 5-0 victory over Stetson and followed with a 15-3 win over Manhattan. Virginia Tech closed out its opening weekend with a 3-2 triumph over Sam Houston State at the Stetson Tournament, before posting a 9-3 win at home over East Tennessee State on Tuesday, Feb. 19.
-The Hokies are led offensively by the trio of Carson Taylor (.563 batting average / 9-for-16, 7 runs, 5 RBI, 4 doubles), Kevin Madden (.400 batting average / 4-for-10, run) and Kerry Carpenter (.313 batting average / 5-for-16, 6 runs, 4 RBI, double, home run). Collectively, Virginia Tech is hitting .277 (32-for-130) as a unit with a .445 on-base percentage. The Hokies have drawn 29 walks on the season and been hit by a pitch 12 times. Three starters are 1-0 on the season, including Luke Scherzer, Ian Seymour and Peyton Alford, while Nathan Starliper has come out of the bullpen to record a win as well.
LOOKING AHEAD TO NEXT WEEK
UNCG's game against Wake Forest, originally set for Tuesday, Feb. 26, has been moved to Wednesday, Feb. 27 at 5 p.m. due to rain in the forecast in the Triad this weekend. The Demon Deacons shifted games back by one day, affecting the date of the game with UNCG.
