GREENSBORO, N.C. – After winning three of four games last week, including a pair of victories against Southern Conference rival Furman over the weekend, the UNCG baseball team looks to use that momentum on Tuesday, April 9th when it heads to Chapel Hill for a 6 p.m. game against North Carolina.
The Spartans, who picked up back-to-back non-conference wins in their last two games against Wake Forest (March 26) and High Point (April 3), are 20-10 on the season. Three of those wins have come on the road, including two against Mercer (March 22, March 24) and one against High Point (Feb. 19).
Meanwhile, North Carolina (23-9) comes into the game on a two-game losing streak after dropping a series to Georgia Tech this weekend. The Tar Heels are 19-2 at home and 16-4 against non-conference opposition.
North Carolina is the first ranked team that UNCG has played this season. The Tar Heels are ranked between ninth and 21st in six different polls this week including the CBI Composite Poll (14th), Baseball America (21st), Collegiate Baseball (21st), D1Baseball.com (16th), NCBWA (14th), Perfect Game (9th), USA Today (18th).
UNCG will send freshman hurler Maddux Holshouser (0-0, 4.32 ERA) to the mound for his third start of the season. His longest outing as a starter was five innings, which came in his first-ever start, against Princeton (March 9). He surrendered four hits, three runs and one walk while striking out three Princeton hitters in a 5-3 UNCG victory.
The Tar Heels will counter with Andrew Grogan (1-0, 4.67 ERA) on the mound. Grogan has appeared in eight games for North Carolina, most recently on Sunday, April 7, at Georgia Tech. He has logged 17.1 innings, allowed 15 hits, 10 runs (nine earned runs) and fanned 16 batters, making three starts along the way.
His three starts this season came against UNC Wilmington (Feb. 26 / March 13) and Charleston Southern (March 5). In the Feb. 26 start against the Seahawks, Grogan had his longest single-game outing of the season, tossing 4.2 innings, allowing three hits, two runs, two earned runs, while striking out five UNC Wilmington hitters.
TAKING A LOOK AT THE NORTH CAROLINA GAME
-The Spartans face their third Atlantic Coast Conference opponent of the season on Tuesday, April 9th, when they head to Chapel Hill to play North Carolina for the first time since April 28, 2015. It will mark the fifth game of the season against an ACC opponent for UNCG, after a pair of contests against Virginia Tech (Feb. 24-25) and meetings with Wake Forest on Feb. 27 and March 26.
-Three members of the UNCG baseball team—Coleman Sawyer, Greg Hardison, Josh Madole—have ongoing hitting streaks of at least 11 games. Sawyer owns the longest hitting streak for the Spartans this season (15 games), surpassing Hardison on Sunday, March 31 against Western Carolina, after Hardison missed the series with the Catamounts due to injury. Madole, who has reached base via a hit in his last 12 games, has put together the second-longest hitting streak of the season in the process.
-The Spartans have faced seven different Atlantic Coast Conference opponents in the seven years under head coach Link Jarrett. UNCG has also squared off against Clemson (twice), Duke (five times), Georgia Tech (three times), NC State (seven times), Virginia Tech (two times) and Wake Forest (12 times). The Spartans are 9-23 in clashes with ACC opponents, with three of the wins coming in extra innings against NC State, Duke and Wake Forest.
-The pair of Chad Sykes and Corey Jackson have proved to be a major force out of the UNCG bullpen in 2019.
The duo ranks among the top of five in six statistical categories for the Spartans, including ERA (Skyes-1st, 0.58 / Jackson-5th, 4.25), wins (Skyes-1st, four / Jackson-1st, four), strikeouts (Sykes-1st, 42 / Jackson-2nd, 37), innings pitched (Sykes-4th, 31 / Jackson-5th, 29.2), appearances (Jackson-1st, 17 / Sykes-t-2nd, 14) and opposing batting average (Sykes-1st, .176 / Jackson-5th, .241).
Along with ranking atop the UNCG staff in multiple statistical categories, Sykes ranks nationally in ERA (2nd-0.58), strikeouts per nine innings (36th-12.19) and hits allowed per nine innings (36th-5.52).
-The two teams have faced only two common opponents at this juncture of the 2019 season—N.C. A&T and Virginia Tech.
North Carolina, ranked No. 5 in the nation when they took on the Aggies, scored two runs in the seventh inning to come away with the 2-1 victory. The Tar Heels were limited to three hits in the game, but a two-run double off the bat of Ashton McGee proved to be the difference. UNCG's meeting with A&T, which came at First National Bank Field on March 19, resulted in an 8-5 win by the Aggies.
The Tar Heels also made a trek to Blacksburg, Va., in 2019, coming away with a 2-1 series win. After dropping the first game by a 4-1 decision on March 22nd, North Carolina took the next two games of the series by scores of 7-5 (March 23) and 5-2 (March 24) to win its second ACC series of the season.
The Hokies and Spartans played two games in late February with Virginia Tech posting a 12-4 win in the first game on Feb. 25. UNCG limited the Hokies to two runs on eight hits in the second game, but Virginia Tech used a seventh inning home run by Kerry Carpenter to escape with the 2-1 victory.
ON DECK FOR THE SPARTANS
UNCG returns to home, where the Spartans own a 17-4 record, to face George Mason in a three-game, non-conference series this weekend. The first game is set to take place on April 12th at 6 p.m., followed by a 3 p.m. contest on Saturday. The series concludes on Sunday, April 14th at 1 p.m.
