Last Week’s Results: Defeated Princeton, won series over NC State 2-1
Record Last Week: 3-1
Overall Record: 19-5
ACC Record: 7-2
Upcoming Schedule: 3/28 vs Coastal Carolina, 3/30-4/1 vs Wake Forest
Heels get a huge series win over NC State but lose Colin Moran to a broken hand.
UNC won a midweek rain shortened game versus Princeton 15-5 in six innings. Colin Moran had a huge game going 4-4 with three RBIs and two runs scored. The Heels broke things open with seven runs in the third inning and followed that up with six more in the sixth. Chris O'Brien started for the Heels but was chased after 2.2 innings giving up two runs, none of them earned. R.C. Orlan followed giving up three runs in 1.1 innings. Chris McCue finished up the work before the weather moved in and ended the game.
Over the weekend UNC played a slightly unusual Saturday-Sunday-Monday series vs NC State to accommodate ESPNU televising the final game on ESPNU. NC State took the first game 3-1 to hand Kent Emanuel his first loss of the season. Emanuel gave up three runs(none earned) in 6.2 innings of work. UNC's defense has been a little suspect this season and it came back to bite the Heels in this one. UNC did manage ten hits with two apiece from Chaz Frank, Mike Zolk and Cody Stubbs but was unable to push more than a fourth inning run across.
In the second game, UNC bounced back with a 4-3 win on the walk-off game winning hit from Tommy Coyle. Chris Munnelly started but lasted only two innings giving up three runs. UNC responded to the 3-0 second inning deficit with three runs in the bottom of the 2nd and 3rd to tie the game. UNC got another outstanding outing from several members of the bullpen with Michael Morin getting his first win of the season in one scoreless inning of work. In the bottom of the ninth Parks Jordan drew a walk and Chaz Frank was hit by a pitch. Following a double play which put Jordan on third Tommy Coyle singled up the middle to win the game.
In the series finale, Tommy Coyle broke a 1-1 tie with a grand slam and Jacob Stallings hit a two run home run in the seventh after NCSU got within one run. Benton Moss started but it was R.C. Orlan's 3.2 innings of middle relief that got him his fourth win of the season. Michael Morin recorded the seven out save striking out three.
After losing the first game with Emanuel pitching it was a huge for the Heels to bounce back and win the final two games after dropping the game the had the best chance of winning. UNC is now 7-2 in the ACC and tied with Miami atop the Coastal Division.
The big news of the weekend was the injury to Colin Moran who played in the series opener versus NC State but not since. When the news leaked that Moran had broken his hand no one could say for certain how the injury happened. Since it didn't happen on the field, the speculation was Moran had done something like punch a wall. While Mike Fox does not say that specifically, he does indicate it was something along those lines(via IC):
After the victory over NC State Coach Fox was asked about where Moran suffered his injury to his hand, "You need to keep your frustrations and temper under control," Fox elaborated. "This is a game of failure and you fail at times. You have to keep those emotions in check both verbally and physically. He did not hurt anyone else lets put it that way. Nobody else on our team had to go to the doctor with him."
Translation? Moran was upset over something that happened in the first game versus NC State and punched a wall. Moran did play the entire game on Saturday but was 1-4 and committed an error. Moran was schedule to have surgery on the hand today and is expected to miss 3-4 weeks.