The Diamond Heels took care of business over the weekend sweeping Maryland in Chapel Hill. UNC has now won six in a row since dropping the first two games versus Miami.
Patrick Johnson struck out 12 on Friday night to give UNC a 5-0 win. 3B Colin Moran had three RBIs to lead an offensive attack.
On Saturday, UNC needed 10 innings to get the job done. The Heels trailed 4-3 heading into the bottom of the ninth where Greg Holt doubled to bring in pinch runner Jeff Bouton who came on after Jacob Stallings had doubled. In the tenth Michael Morin retired the Terps in order and Ben Bunting got a bases loaded single to plate Levi Michael with the game winner. In a somewhat surprising move, Mike Fox was very economical with the pitchers in this game only using three.
In the series finale on Sunday, Colin Moran continued to swing a hot bat going 4-5 with a home run and two RBIs to lead the Heels to a 8-4 win and the sweep. Chris Munnelly gave up four runs in 5.1 innings which meant extensive use of the bullpen which did not give up a run in the final 3.2. Once again Morin closed the deal.
UNC is now 37-10 overall and 16-8 in the ACC. The discussion and focus now turns to whether UNC can get themselves positioned for a national seed(top eight overall) in the NCAA Tournament. Prior to the debacle versus NCSU, the Heels were in a great spot but that sweep and the two losses versus Miami dropped them back a bit. ESPN's Jeremy Mills who writes for their College Baseball Blog said last week UNC is in the running for a national seed but in his latest projections he had FSU at #7 and UNC only hosting a regional. That makes the trip to Atlanta this weekend very important in making the case for a national seed.