No. 4 Virginia Downs Richmond 8-2 for Program-Record 19th Straight Home Win

The Cavaliers have not lost at Disharoon Park since last May

Author:
Matt Newton
Publish date:
Mar 29, 2022 11:44 PM EDT

Newly minted a consensus top four team in the country, No. 4 Virginia looked the part on Tuesday as the Cavaliers beat Richmond 8-2 to record their 19th-straight victory at Disharoon Park, breaking a UVA program record for consecutive home wins.

Virginia scored a run in each of the first three innings to take a 3-0 lead. Griff O'Ferrall led off the bottom of the first with a double and then came around to score on a double by Devin Ortiz, who also started on the mound for the Cavaliers and picked up his fourth victory of the season.

In the bottom of the second, Chris Newell drew a walk, advanced to second on a wild pitch, and then scored on a single by Casey Saucke. In the following inning, Ortiz helped himself again with a leadoff double and then scored on a Jake Gelof single. Ortiz pitched four scoreless innings, allowing just two hits and striking out eight batters.

The Spiders got on the board in the top of the fifth as Jay Woolfolk allowed an unearned run. Christian Beal hit a fly ball to right field and Casey Saucke was unable to make the catch. Beal managed to leg the play out into a triple and then scored on a groundout by Alden Mathes.

It was sloppy defensive game for both teams, as Richmond committed four fielding errors and Virginia had three errors.

UVA responded immediately in the bottom half of the inning as the first three Cavalier batters got on board. Gelof scored on a sacrifice fly by Saucke and then Ethan Anderson singled to right field to score Alex Tappen. Max Cotier reached base on the second Richmond fielding error of the inning, which also scored Newell to make it 6-1. The Cavaliers threatened to blow the game open, but they stranded the bases loaded.

Richmond scored again in the top of the sixth as Andrew Papantonis took Woolfolk deep to left field for a home run. That was the only long ball of the game, as UVA did not hit a home run for just the second home game this season.

The Virginia pitching staff shut down the Spiders for the remainder of the game. Matthew Buchanan pitched the rest of the sixth, followed by Dylan Bowers, Matt Wyatt, and Will Geerdes, who each pitched a scoreless inning without surrendering a hit.

Virginia added two more runs as Devin Ortiz scored on a wild pitch in the seventh and Cotier singled to score Saucke in the eighth.

With the win, Virginia improves to 23-2 overall. UVA has won 19-consecutive home games, beating the previous program record of 18-straight home victories by the 2008 Cavaliers. Virginia's 19-game home winning streak is the third-longest active streak in college baseball.

Virginia is set to face its first ranked opponent of the season this weekend as the Cavaliers welcome No. 22 Georgia Tech for a three-game ACC series at Disharoon Park. First pitch for game 1 is scheduled for 6pm on Friday.

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