North Carolina State University Athletics
NC State Baseball Faces First ACC Road Test
3/23/2006 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
March 23, 2006
RALEIGH, N.C. - There's no place like home, at least not in ACC baseball. NC State, with two home series under its belt, is 5-1 in the conference and tied for the lead in the Atlantic Division with No. 1-ranked Florida State.
Now the Wolfpack will find out what life is like on the road in the nation's toughest baseball conference. The Pack travels to Clemson this weekend to take on one of the eight ACC teams currently residing in one or more of the five national polls. The Tigers (13-6 overall and 0-3 in the ACC) rank anywhere from No. 8 to No. 13, depending on which poll you check.
Clemson got off to a rocky start in the conference last weekend, getting swept at Virginia, but that's life on the road in the ACC. So far, there have been 36 ACC games played, and the visiting team has won just 12 of them, and five of those road victories were at Duke. Take the Blue Devils' six ACC games out of the equation and road teams are just 7-23 in conference play this season.
NC State will be a road team in the conference this weekend for the first time in 2006, and Death Valley has not been a fun place for the Wolfpack to visit. NC State has not won a series at Clemson since taking two of three there in 1996. Since the ACC went to its current format of three-game series each weekend, NC State has gone 0-for-Tigertown four times in eight trips.
"This league is so strong this year that there really are no easy weekends, and that's especially true on the road," Wolfpack coach Elliott Avent said. "It's so hard to win anywhere on the road in the ACC, but I think that's especially true at Clemson.
"I love going there to play. It's a great environment, and they support the Tigers really well. On top of that, they have an outstanding team. They play hard, and they've got great pitching. You've got to execute the little things and be prepared to win low-scoring games when you play Clemson."
The Wolfpack comes into the series this weekend on a high note, having taken two of three games at Doak Field at Dail Park against then-No. 1-ranked Georgia Tech.
"There were times this weekend against Georgia Tech when we played about as well as we can play, but we definitely have to pitch better," Avent said. "We'll have to play at a very high level this weekend if we're going to be successful at Clemson."
Game times for the series are 7:15 p.m. on Friday, 7 p.m. on Saturday, and 1 p.m. on Sunday. All three games will be broadcast live on WKNC (88.1 FM) and online at gopack.com.
THE STARTING PITCHERS: Redshirt-sophomore righthander Eryk McConnell (4-2, 2.50) will start the series opener for the Wolfpack. McConnell, a transfer from Western Carolina, is less than two years removed from Tommy John ligament transplant surgery. He has made seven appearances, all starts, allowing 31 hits in 39 2/3 innings. He has walked eight and struck out 32. His last outing, March 17 vs. Georgia Tech, was McConnell's shortest of the season, just 4 1/3 innings. He allowed one run on three hits, but walked a season-high four and threw 88 pitches. He struck out six, but did not figure in the decision, an 8-1 victory for the Wolfpack.
Freshman lefthander Eric Surkamp (2-0, 3.28) will start on Saturday for the Wolfpack. Surkamp has made seven appearances, four of them out of the bullpen. He has allowed nine runs on 20 hits in 24 2/3 innings. He has walked eight and struck out 22. In his last appearance, a start March 18 vs. Georgia Tech, Surkamp allowed three runs on six hits in 5 2/3 innings. He walked three and struck out five. He left the game with an 8-3 lead, but Tech rallied late to tie the game at 9-9 and force extra innings. NC State won 12-11 in 10 innings, but Surkamp was no longer the pitcher of record.
Junior righthander Gib Hobson (4-1, 5.50) or sophomore righthander Andrew Brackman (0-1, 13.50) will start the final game of the series for the Wolfpack. Hobson has made seven appearances, all starts, and has allowed 24 runs, 22 of them earned, on 42 hits in 36 innings. He has walked 12 and struck out 30. Hobson's last start was March 19 vs. Georgia Tech. He allowed five runs, all earned, on seven hits in 4 1/3 innings.
Brackman is back with the NC State baseball team full-time now that basketball season is over in West Raleigh. He has made two appearances, both starts, and has allowed eight runs, seven earned, on 12 hits in 4 2/3 innings. He has walked one and struck out four. Brackman's last outing was March 5 vs. UCLA, and the Bruins treated him unkindly, scoring five runs on six hits in 2 1/3 innings. He struck out two and did not issue a walk. The Wolfpack lost 13-2, the first time in Brackman's 12 career appearances that NC State lost a baseball game in which Brackman's name appeared in the box score.
NC STATE VS. CLEMSON: The Tigers lead the series with the Wolfpack, 93-64. The two teams split four games a year ago, with NC State taking two of three at Doak Field and the Tigers eliminating the Pack from the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament in Jacksonville, Fla. The Tigers have won 19 of the last 28 meetings with the Wolfpack, dating back to the 1997 Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament in St. Petersburg, Fla.
NC STATE LEADING ACC IN OFFENSE: Will Kimmey of Baseball America said in a recent on-line chat that NC State may have the best offense in the country. We'll leave that judgement to Will, but according to the latest conference statistics released by the ACC office, the Wolfpack certainly has to rank as one of the best offenses in the ACC. NC State leads the conference in batting (.367), on-base percentage (.465), runs (275) doubles, RBIs (247), walks (158) and sacrifice flies (24). In conference games only, NC State leads the league in batting (.357), runs (56) and RBIs (50).
NC State is on pace to shatter several single-season team records for offense. The Wolfpack heads into play this weekend at Clemson hitting .367 as a team, which is 21 points higher than the school record of .346 set in 1988. The Wolfpack has scored 275 runs on 349 base hits. The school records for runs is 571 set in 1988, and the record for hits is 766 set in 1997. The 1988 team scored 272 runs through 26 games, four behind the current team. The 1994 team had 330 hits through 26 games, which is 19 behind this year's pace.
This year's Wolfpack has drawn 158 walks through 26 games, which is well ahead of the pace set by the 1997 team, which drew 128 walks through 26 games on its way to a school-record 337 bases-on-balls for the season. The school record for doubles is 161 in 68 games back in 1991, an average of 2.37 doubles per game. This year's team has hit 72 doubles in 26 games, an average of 2.77 doubles per game.
NC STATE IN THE RANKINGS: There's nothing like taking a series from the No. 1 team in the country to improve a team's standings in the national polls. NC State moved from 20th to 12th in the latest USA Today coaches poll, and from 19th to 14th in the National Collegiate Baseball Writers poll. The Wolfpack jumped from the ranks of the unranked all the way to No. 20 in the Baseball America poll, and from No. 22 to No. 22 in Collegiate Baseball. In The Rosenblatt Report, NC State checks in at No. 25 this week after being unranked for two weeks.
THE ACC IN THE RANKINGS: A quartet of ACC teams has dominated the national polls this season, and both this weekend's opponent (Clemson) and last weekend's opponent (Georgia Tech) have been among that cluster of ACC teams in the high-rent district. Georgia Tech and Clemson have both taken turns in the No. 1 spot, and Florida State is at No. 1 in three of the five polls this week. North Carolina is a consensus top 5 club. Miami and NC State have been in and out of the rankings most of the season, and Wake Forest and Virginia both have broken into the lower reaches of the national polls recently, giving the ACC eight ranked teams.
Following are the ACC teams in this week's national polls:
Baseball America: 3-North Carolina; 5-Georgia Tech; 6-Florida State; 10-Clemson; 20-NC State; 24-Virginia.
Collegiate Baseball: 1-Florida State; 4-Georgia Tech; 6-North Carolina; 12-Miami; 13-Clemson; 20-NC State; 21-Virginia.
NCBWA: 1-Florida State; 2-North Carolina; 5-Georgia Tech; 11-Clemson; 14-NC State; 21-Miami; 25-Virginia.
The Rosenblatt Report: 2-North Carolina; 3-Florida State; 6-Georgia Tech; 8-Clemson; 22-Virginia; 24-Wake Forest; 25-NC State.
USA Today: 1-Florida State; 2-North Carolina; 6-Georgia Tech; 11-Clemson; 12-NC State; 14-Miami; 22-Virginia.
NC STATE VS. NO. 1: After taking two of three games from No. 1-ranked Georgia Tech last weekend, NC State has won four of its last six games against teams ranked No. 1 in the country. On May 15, 2004, the Pack swept a doubleheader at then-top-ranked Texas, winning 1-0 and 2-0, then lost 19-5 to Miami on June 5, 2004, in the NCAA Coral Gables Regional. NC State did not play a game against a team ranked No. 1 in 2005.
MANGUM ON A TEAR: As if the NC State lineup wasn't strong enough, junior catcher Caleb Mangum has emerged as the Wolfpack's hottest hitter of late. Mangum, who leads the team with a .460 average for the season, is hitting .526 (10-for-19) with a double, a triple, two home runs and six RBIs in the last five games. The triple and the two homers are the first of his career. His two-run ninth-inning homer March 12 vs. Boston College lifted NC State to a 12-11 walk-off victory over the Golden Eagles.
HE'S BAA-AACK: Saying that NC State first baseman Aaron Bates was struggling earlier this season is not exactly accurate. He was only struggling when compared to the ridiculously high standard he set a year ago, when he batted .425 and hit .500 over the last 24 games of the season.
Following an 0-for-4 afternoon March 10 vs. Boston College, Bates was hitting .307 with six doubles, three homers and 12 RBIs in 20 games. Respectable numbers, but hardly vintage Bates.
A postgame session that evening with the coaching staff in the batting cages at Doak Field at Dail Park worked some of the kinks out of Bates's swing, and you know the rest of the story. In five games since then, Bates is batting .538 (14-for-26) with four doubles, one home run, five RBIs and 10 runs scored. He was so hot March 18 vs. Georgia Tech (4-for-6, two doubles, a home run and four RBIs) that the Yellow Jackets went out of their way to pitch around Bates in the series finale on March 19, walking him intentionally three times in six plate appearances.
CAMP HITTING STREAK: Looking to rebound from what for him was an offseason in 2005, senior outfielder Matt Camp has gotten off to a hot start in 2006, and has gotten hotter as the season has progressed. Camp currently is riding a 14-game hitting streak and has batted .418 (23-for-55) with seven doubles, 15 runs scored and 11 RBIs. He has lifted his batting average for the season a whopping 83 points, from .267 to its current .350.
