University of North Carolina Athletics
Run For ACC Baseball Title Begins Wednesday
May 21, 2002 | Baseball
May 21, 2002
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- Coming off its best ACC regular-season finish since 1990, North Carolina faces Virginia in the first round of the 2002 ACC Baseball Championship at Florida Power Park in St. Petersburg, Fla., on Wednesday at 8:30 p.m. The Tar Heels are 39-17 overall, and, at 17-7 in the ACC, finished third in the conference standings behind first-place Florida State and second-place Wake Forest . The Tar Heels had not finished higher than fourth in the ACC since winning the conference title in 1990 and Carolina's 17 wins in 2002 match the 17 wins of the 1990 Tar Heels as the most ACC victories by a Carolina team.
"Florida State, going from 3-6 to winning 15 in a row in the league, is certainly the team to beat, but anybody can step up with as many good teams as there are in the ACC," said head coach Mike Fox, who is just three wins shy of the 700th victory of his 19-year college coaching career. "And we're certainly not looking past Virginia on Wednesday."
Carolina is 7-4 all-time versus Virginia in ACC Tournament games and 54-46 overall in the conference championship. UNC, which last faced the Cavs in 1991 in the tournament, has won four of its last five ACC Tournament meetings with Virginia and defeated the Cavaliers in 1982 for its first of four all-time ACC titles.
In their regular-season meeting with Virginia, the Tar Heels won two of three games in Charlottesville, including a 5-0 win on March 30 where Garry Bakker became the first UNC freshman to throw a complete-game shutout since 1984 in beating the Cavs. Virginia won the final game of the series to end UNC's eight-game winning streak to open ACC play.
"It's going to be a story of who can get some good starting pitching, and then it will be a battle of the bullpens down the stretch," Fox said. "There are some great offensive teams, but I think the team that pitches the best is going to put themselves in a great position."
While Carolina's pitching staff emerged as one of the top in the ACC this season, its offensive production has been staggering in 2002 and is one pace to be the most accomplished unit in school history.
Through the end of the 56-game regular season, the Tar Heels have set new school records for doubles and extra-base hits, tied the school record for home runs and have nearly all other major team categories in sight. Carolina set its extra-base-hit and doubles records last weekend at Georgia Tech and Adam Greenberg tied the 16-year-old home run record of 95 with a solo shot in Sunday's 6-1 win in the series-finale.
The Tar Heels are batting .324 as a team, the highest average in school history, and are just three bases behind setting a new total base record. New records for runs, hits, RBIs and slugging percentage are also within reach .
"I think Virginia's capable of beating anybody," Fox said. "But we'll try to get this first one, because if we don't then we have a real tough hill to climb."
Play in the double-elimination tournament begins Wednesday at 10 a.m. with fourth-seeded Clemson facing fifth-seeded Georgia Tech. Top-seeded Florida State faces the winner of the Maryland/Duke play-in game at 1:30 p.m., while Wake Forest and seventh-seeded NC State play at 5 p.m. before the Tar Heels and Cavaliers finish the day with an 8:30 p.m. matchup.
