Wolfpack to play for ACC Baseball Championship @ 1pm

General21

It was a wild day at the ACC Baseball Tournament in Greensboro. You can follow the tournament online at the ACC’s Championship Website.

NC State was smoked by Georgia Tech Saturday morning, losing 17-5 in what ultimately was meaningless game after the Yellow Jackets lost to Clemson later in the day. The nightcap saw NC State lose a 7-1 lead with 2 outs in the 4th inning only to battle back and beat #25 ranked Virginia Tech by a 10-9 score in 10 innings. (Link)

Pratt Maynard’s RBI single in the 10th inning helped North Carolina State beat Virginia Tech 10-9 and reach the Atlantic Coast Conference championship game.

In a virtual semifinal that didn’t end until early Sunday, Kyle Wilson started the rally when he was hit by a pitch and was bunted to second. He came around to score on Maynard’s single off Ben Rowen.

Virginia Tech (38-20) put the winning run on base with two outs in the 10th after Jake Buchanan hit two batters.

Grant Sasser entered and got Ronnie Shaban to fly out, ending it at 1:25 a.m. – more than 15 hours after the Wolfpack started their long Saturday by beating Georgia Tech in the completion of Friday night’s suspended game.

N.C. State (38-21) will play Florida State on Sunday for the title.

If you are looking for some real-time talk on a host of NC State-related topics we ask that you make our message forums a regular stop amongst your internet surfing. This link will take you to the ACC Baseball Tournament discussion.

Today marks the 4th appearance in the ACC Championship game in 14 years at NC State for Head Coach, Elliot Avent. Avent is yet to produce an ACC Title, a first place regular season finish, or an appearance in the College World Series.

Since Avent took the reigns at NC State, six other Atlantic Coast Conference programs have managed to advance to at least one CWS. Since 1996:
* Miami has attended 8 CWS
* Clemson has attended 4 CWS
* Georgia Tech has attended 2 CWS
* UNC-CH has attended 4 CWS
* Florida State has attended 4 CWS
* Virginia has attended 1 CWS
* Ray Tanner’s South Carolina has attended 3 CWS

The irony that NC State could win our first Championship in one of the Big Four sports (Football, Basketball, Baseball, Women’s Basketball) in our very first attempt after the University and Lee Fowler announced their split would be one of the biggest cherries on top of a pie that I could ever imagine.

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General

21 Responses to Wolfpack to play for ACC Baseball Championship @ 1pm

  1. Dr. BadgerPack 05/29/2010 at 10:32 AM #

    This tournament is done.

    Can’t catch 1 friggin’ break.

  2. phillypacker 05/29/2010 at 11:05 AM #

    Is the baseball game still in a rain delay?

  3. Dr. BadgerPack 05/29/2010 at 11:13 AM #

    State trails 6-5 in the 5th… going on now. Most discussion is going on in the Forums. Mainly consisting of me whining.

  4. StateFans 05/29/2010 at 11:15 AM #

    State mounting a comeback. Down 6-5 after being down 6-1

  5. Lock 05/29/2010 at 1:33 PM #

    “HWSNBN II”? Really?

    Really?

    I mean, I don’t even have an especially strong liking of the guy, but come on.

    Really?

  6. StateFans 05/29/2010 at 2:23 PM #

    Lock,

    Not taking a side…but, the parallels are pretty striking.

    What has Avent ever won in his 13? 14? years?

    He has advanced to one Super Regional just as HWSNBN advanced to one Sweet 16.

    No titles to speak of. Few Top 3 finishes in the league. Load up on cupcake non-conference opponents. Squeak into the NCAA Tournament and not make much noise.

    What specifics would you offer that are NOT similar to this point? (Of course, this could all change with a Championship this year).

  7. sbas2 05/29/2010 at 2:50 PM #

    as to whether Avent needs to be replaced will be a discussion for another day. with regard to State getting soundly beaten by Georgia Tech, State really got hurt by last nights rain delay. State’s number one pitcher, Jake Buchannan, pitched one half inning last night and rightly so, did not pitch today. why Avent and Holliday went to Lambert as the starting pitcher raises a question. Lambert has not pitched much this year as he cannot find the strike zone. should Avent and Holliday have went to Mazzoni? State fell behind 6-1 due to Lambert giving up a number of walks and Riggins failing to make a play on a grounder at first with bases loaded. despite Riggins home run, he played poorly defensively as did Ciencin. after Holiday went to Ogborn, State got back into the game closing the score to 6-5. once Ogborn got into trouble, Holiday’s pitching choices appeared to indicate that State had conceded the game.
    in order for State to advance to the championship game, Clemson has to beat GT and State has to beat VT. if State, VT and GT all end up 2-1, GT advances via the tie breaker of a better regular season winning per centage.

  8. SaccoV 05/29/2010 at 3:04 PM #

    Statefans, I believe that State has earned a whopping 2 Super Regional births under Avent in 2003 and 2008. To lend a little comfort to our friend Lock, in 2003, State traveled to Coral Gables and held a 5-run lead into the 8th inning against Miami in Game 1 … they lost in 10. Game 2, State let an early lead slip away and Miami went to Omaha again. In 2008, State beat Georgia in Game 2 but got throttled in Game 3. Georgia ends up being National Runner-ups. Avent has lead the team to 3 ACC Finals appearances and has lost all three, two to GA Tech and one to Wake Forest.

  9. packfanatic17 05/29/2010 at 4:04 PM #

    I thought we lost in one ACC championship to Clemson a few years back. I remember Matt Mangini on third base made a few costly errors.

  10. StateFans 05/29/2010 at 4:16 PM #

    sbas2 – I don’t think the conversation is about Avent needing to be replaced. Just some interesting parallels between his record and HWSNN.

    Interesting that it appears that you can add colossal collapses to the parallels and the fact that each advanced to three ACC Championships without winning a single title.

    Hopefully the 4th time is the charm!

  11. SaccoV 05/29/2010 at 5:03 PM #

    You’re right, PackFanatic … It was one to Wake, one to GA Tech and one to Clemson. Sorry for the error.

  12. sbas2 05/30/2010 at 1:45 AM #

    State Fans, when i was writing that it was not the time to discuss Avent being replaced, i was really referring to myself-not the time for me to discuss it because i wanted to write about the game this morning. i can see how this was not clear and i do reconize the parallels between Sendek and Avent.
    anyway, Avent and Holiday’s pitching plans panned out but does State have anything for tomorrow?

    great game tonight. Jake was awesome.
    i do want to make a correction about this mornings game. it was Berqquist who made the costly errors instead of Ciencin.
    Riggins also had a great game tonight both defensively and especially offensively. i will be at the game tomorrow and no matter the outcome, i will enjoy it.

  13. ryebread 05/30/2010 at 10:18 AM #

    I’ve watched almost every game in the tournament. In a way, this team gives me almost as much hope that the tide might finally turn as the team two years ago did.

    The reason that I think that is the style of play. NC State in recent memory has been a small ball team that tried to rely on pitching and defense. It was almost a HWSNBN-like approach. This team relies on hitting — both for average and for power. In the top 6 or so hitting stats, we’re #1 in the ACC in 5 of them and #2 in one of them (homers).

    What I personally have seen recently in the college game is that the good hitting teams (particularly ones for power) are the ones that end up in Omaha. That Georgia/Fresno State final 2 years ago is a great example. Neither team had great pitching, nor played great defense. They could REALLY put numbers on the scoreboard though.

    Now, I’m NOT saying this team is Omaha bound. I think we’re about 1-2 arms and a little bit of fielding short (note that I’m saying we’re flawed enough in the other two aspects to hold us back, so the other aspects obviously are critically important). I am saying that I like the attitude, attack mentality and style of play and I think it’s something we can build on.

    I’m pulling for the Pack 9. I won’t say “make us proud” because the win last night under some very disadvantageous conditions has already done that for me. I think the team may be too gassed and too thin to expect to pull one out today. I will be watching and cheering though!

  14. wolfpackdawg 05/30/2010 at 11:59 AM #

    OMG..we have a chance at an ACC championship in something…awesome!

    We have never made it to Omaha correct?

  15. whit25 05/30/2010 at 12:37 PM #

    The Pack has been to Omaha once, in 1968. They won 2 games, but were eliminated by USC. USC went through the CWS undefeated that year to claim the title.

  16. baxter 05/30/2010 at 1:14 PM #

    apparently the game is replaced by the charlotte networks w/ the Braves game, wtf?

  17. Sweet jumper 05/30/2010 at 2:58 PM #

    Pack leads 3-2 bottom of the 6th.

  18. wolfonthehill 05/30/2010 at 4:45 PM #

    And now down two runs in the bottom of the 8th… ah, the life of a Pack fan… we get there so often, yet win so seldom…

  19. blpack 05/30/2010 at 6:10 PM #

    It didn’t work out again today. The team showed a lot of heart, but it needed more arms and hits. Hopefully our season will continue.

  20. islandbreeze 05/30/2010 at 9:49 PM #

    Avent 0 ACC championships
    0 CWS appearances

  21. Classof89 05/31/2010 at 8:05 PM #

    Of our errors this season, how many were at the SS position?

    One Shortstop and one ace reliever short of an ACC championship. Once again we are a day late and a dollar short. Reminds me of Herb’s and Les’s team in another way. When we have great pitching, we have no hitting (the Joey Devine year). When we have great hitting, we have weak pitching. Seemed like whenever Herb had a great backcourt or frontcourt, it was balanced out by an awful hole elsewhere on the floor…

    In any event, nice to see the team pull it together into at least a respectable finish. If you had told me after the BC series this was an NCAA team, I would have laughed at you.

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