North Carolina State University Athletics
Baseball Takes Out Fourth-Ranked North Carolina 11-1
4/27/2007 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
NC State, ranked 24th, improved to 29-14 overall and 12-10 in the ACC with the victory. North Carolina, ranked No. 4, dropped to 35-10 overall and 14-8 in the conference. Surkamp (4-2) won for the first time since March 30 at Boston College. He allowed just one run on eight hits, walked two and struck out three and was in command throughout. The Tar Heels only got three runners into scoring position against Surkamp, and only one reached third base through the first six innings. He retired the leadoff hitter in all seven innings he worked. Robert Woodard (7-2), a Wolfpack nemesis the last three seasons, took the loss after allowing a career-high eight runs on a career-high 12 hits in just 4 1/3 innings. He walked two and struck out four.
Jones went 2-for-3 with an RBI double and the grand slam. Ferguson had four hits in four at-bats, scored three times and drove in a run. Poulk also went 4-for-4, scored three times and drove in three runs. Ryan Pond went 3-for-4 and scored three times. Seth Williams and Kyle Seager both went 2-for-4 for North Carolina, with Seager scoring the Tar Heels’ run and Williams driving it in.
The Wolfpack got to Woodard suddenly in the bottom of the second inning. Ferguson led off with an opposite-field single through the left side of the infield, and Pond singled over the glove of shortstop Josh Horton and into left field. Poulk laid down a bunt to the left of the mound and beat it out for an infield single, loading the bases for Jones, who made it 4-0 with one swing of the bat, driving a grand-slam home run to straightaway center field. The Wolfpack probably took the wind out of UNC’s sails with a huge defensive play in the top of the third inning. Seager reached on a one-out single up the middle, and went to third on Reid Fronk’s single to right field. With two down, Dustin Ackley walked to load the bases. Tim Federowicz hit a line drive towards right-center, but Poulk laid out and made a diving catch for the final out of the inning. Had the ball gotten past Poulk, it most likely would have cleared the bases and gotten the Tar Heels back into the game. Instead, the Tar Heels put a zero on the board, and the Wolfpack added two more runs in the bottom half of the inning. Ferguson got it started, again going to other way with a bloop single that cleared the third baseman and hit the left-field line. Pond smoked a double into the gap in left-center to put runners on second and third, and Poulk lined a shot up the middle, through Woodward and into center field. Poulk, running hard all the way, hustled it into a double, scoring Ferguson and Pond to give he Wolfpack a 6-0 lead. Caleb Mangum hit a one-out double off the wall in left-center field in the bottom of the fourth inning. With two down, Ramon Corona walked, and Ferguson singled to right field, driving in Mangum to give the Wolfpack a 7-0 lead. Ferguson was cut down trying to advance to second base on the throw home for the final out of the inning. Poulk got the Wolfpack started with a one-out single in the bottom of the fifth, then scored all the way from first on Jones’s doubled into the left-field corner to make it 8-0. North Carolina averted the shutout in the top of the seventh. Seager hit a one-out double to right-center and scored when Williams flared a single into shallow right field. The Wolfpack blew the game open with three runs in the bottom of the seventh. Ferguson led off with a single to right, and Pond singled off third baseman Chad Flack’s glove and into left field. Ferguson went all the way to third on the play. Poulk laid down a perfect squeeze bunt and was safe with an RBI single when no one covered first base for the Tar Heels. Pond took second on the play. Jones sacrificed the runners to second and third. Drew Martin drove in Pond with a sacrifice fly to center field, and Vince Gutierrez singled to right field to score Poulk and give NC State a 10-run lead at 11-1. Notes: Jones’s grand slam was NC State’s fourth of the season, two shy of the team record of six, set in 1997 ... The four runs in the second inning surpassed NC State’s previous total of runs against Woodard in the previous three years combined. The Pack came into the game having scored three runs on just eight hits in 17 2/3 innings against the Tar Heel ace ... The eight runs and 12 hits allowed by Woodard were new career highs. He had previously never allowed more than six runs or nine hits in a game ... NC State retired Horton in consecutive plate appearances in the second, fourth, sixth and eighth innings, only the third time in eight games that Horton had gone consecutive plate appearances without a hit. Horton now is hitless in his last six at-bats vs. NC State pitching ... The attendance for the game was 2,982, a new record for Doak Field at Dail Park since it was renovated in 2003-04. The previous record was 2,900 on April 6, 2005, vs. East Carolina ... Corona’s walk in the fourth inning was his 33rd of the season. He walked just 32 times his freshman and sophomore seasons combined ... Pat Ferguson had a career high with four base hits, and Marcus Jones had a career high with five RBIs. NC State and North Carolina will play the second game of the series on Saturday at 7 p.m. The game will be broadcast live on WKNC (88.1 FM) and on the internet on gopack.com through Pack Pass. Tickets for the remainder of the series are completely sold out, but plenty of seats remain for the Wolfpack’s remaining home games: vs Campbell on May 4-5, vs. UNC Asheville on May 15, and vs. Clemson on Mary 17-18-19.
