Notre Dame Completes Sweep Over No. 8 Virginia With Doubleheader Wins

The dreaded mid-season slump has arrived for the Virginia baseball team. After dropping only four of their first 34 games, the Cavaliers are now 2-5 over their last seven games having just suffered a series sweep at the hands of the Fighting Irish this weekend, capped by a pair of frustrating losses in a Sunday doubleheader at Notre Dame.

With Saturday's game 2 pushed to Sunday due to rain, UVA marched out its normal game 3 starter Jack O'Connor to start the doubleheader. O'Connor gave up a solo homer to Carter Putz and an RBI double to DM Jefferson in the bottom of the first to give an early 2-0 advantage to the Fighting Irish, who led wire-to-wire. Notre Dame added one run in the third on a solo shot by Jack Penney and another run in the fourth on an RBI single by Zack Prajzner.

The bigger issue for Virginia was the lack of offensive production from one of the best batting lineups in all of college baseball. Notre Dame starter Blake Hely was a step ahead of the UVA batters from the jump, giving up just one hit through the first four innings. Hely's only blemish on the game was a two-run home run by Anthony Stephan that temporarily gave the Cavaliers life in the top of the sixth inning, but Notre Dame responded right away with a three-run home run by Vinny Martinez to push the Irish lead back to 7-2.

Hely finished with a brilliant statline of just two earned runs on six hits in 7.1 innings of work, throwing a total of 116 pitches. Notre Dame scored one run in the seventh on Prazjner's second homer, the fourth home run of the game for the Irish and their tenth of the series, as they hit six long balls in the opening game of the series on Friday. UVA's Jacob Hodorovich allowed two runs in the eighth as Notre Dame put the finishing touches on a dominant 10-2 win.

With hopes of putting that loss behind them and salvaging the series in game 3, the Cavaliers showed much more fight in the second game of the doubleheader.

UVA struck first in the top of the second as Ethan Anderson drew a leadoff walk, advanced to second on an error, moved to third on a fly-out, and came home on a sacrifice squeeze bunt from Harrison Didawick. Notre Dame responded right away in the bottom of the inning as Martinez hit a leadoff double off of UVA starter Nick Parker and eventually scored on a sacrifice fly by Jefferson. The Irish then took the lead in the third as Prajzner doubled and then scored on a single from Putz.

Virginia answered in the fourth as Casey Saucke went the opposite way for a two-run home run to right field, putting the Cavaliers in front 3-2. UVA put together a two-out rally in the fifth to extend the lead as Griff O'Ferrall got on board with a single and then scored all the way from first on a double down the left field line from Kyle Teel.

Virginia's 4-2 lead didn't last long as Nick Parker got himself into a jam in the bottom of the fifth. A single and an error gave the Irish second and third with one out. UVA brought in Jake Berry, but he was unable to contain the damage as Notre Dame scored three unearned runs. Estevan Moreno managed to steal home and then Martinez delivered a two-run double to give the Fighting Irish a 5-4 lead. That ended up being the deciding sequence as neither team scored for the remainder of the game.

Berry did well to put zeroes on the board in the sixth, seventh, and eighth innings and struck out seven Irish batters to keep it at just a one-run deficit, but the Cavaliers couldn't find a single run in their final four turns at the plate to extend the game.

After giving up the RBI double to Teel, Notre Dame reliever Caden Spivey was virtually unhittable for the next four innings, retiring 12-consecutive Cavalier batters. Casey Saucke kept UVA alive with a two-out double down the left field line in the top of the ninth and Colin Tuft was hit by a pitch to keep things going, but Luke Hanson then flied out to right field and Notre Dame secured the series sweep.

It was a well below standard performance in all facets for Virginia this weekend. The UVA pitching staff gave up 25 runs on 35 hits across the three games, while the vaunted Cavalier bats managed just 13 total runs on 22 hits in the series. Almost unfathomably, Jake Gelof went 0 for 12 at the plate this weekend.

The disappointing trip to South Bend drops Virginia to 32-9 overall and 12-9 in ACC play. UVA is now tied with Miami for second place in the ACC Coastal standings and trails first-place Duke (12-8) by half a game.

After a couple of mid-week games against Liberty on Tuesday at 6pm and Towson on Wednesday at 6pm, the Cavaliers will look to regain their place at the top of the ACC Coastal as Duke comes to Charlottesville for a three-game series this weekend.

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