North Carolina State University Athletics
No. 18 Baseball Breezes Past Campbell, 8-2
5/2/2008 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
RALEIGH, N.C. The offense took the suspense out of this game early, and Clayton Shunick did the rest. Staked to a 7-1 lead after two innings, NC State’s ace righthander battled through uncharacteristic command problems to twirl a tidy two-hitter through seven innings Friday night as the 18th-ranked Wolfpack defeated Campbell 8-2 at Doak Field at Dail Park.
NC State, which won for the 17th time in its last 21 games, improved to 31-13 on the season. Campbell fell to 17-29.
Shunick, who improved to 6-4 on the season and lowered his ERA to 2.18, was not his usual self. The pinpoint control was not there, evidenced by three walks and three hit batters, but after yielding a two-out single to Carlton Floyd in the first and a leadoff homer to Mike Causey in the second, Shunick shut the Camels down. He walked a batter in the second, hit one and walked one in the third, and hit another in the sixth. Despite allowing eight baserunners, Shunick finished strong, retiring 12 of the last 13 men he faced before handing the ball off to the Sam Brown to start the eighth.
Any pressure Shunick might have felt from his spotty command was alleviated by an offense that badly mistreated Raleigh native Justin Lilly, Campbell’s Friday night starter in Big South games. Lilly, who dropped to 4-3, was raked for seven runs on eight hits in one-plus innings of work. He found himself in trouble right off the bat in the bottom of the first, allowing singles to Dallas Poulk and Pat Ferguson to start the inning. Jeremy Synan, Marcus Jones, Ryan Pond and Nick Stanley hit consecutive one-out RBI singles to make it 4-0, and Tommy Foschi made it a five-run inning with a sacrifice fly.
Poulk and Ferguson started the bottom of the second the same way they started the first, with back-to-back singles, knocking Lilly from the game. Reliever Hunter Ford gave up an RBI single to Matt Payne and a sacrifice fly to Pond to make it 7-1, but otherwise pitched well, carrying the Camels into the sixth without allowing further damage. Jeremy Synan’s line-drive homer down the line in right ended Ford’s evening. He wound up allowing just the one run on three hits in 4 1/3 innings.
Handed an 8-1 lead, Brown pitched a scoreless eighth inning, but Travis High wobbled through the ninth, allowing a run on a hit, a walk and a pair of wild pitches. John Watlington’s sacrifice fly got the run home.
NC State continues the weekend homestand, the final weekend at home of the regular season, on Saturday with a 6:30 p.m. game against High Point. The game will be broadcast live on WKNC-FM (88.1) and on the internet at gopack.com through the Pack Pass package.
