The NC State baseball team returns home after four games in Durham to face archrival UNC-Chapel Hill at Doak Field at Dail Park.
The three-game series between the Wolfpack (31-8, 15-6 ACC) and Tar Heels, who entered their game Wednesday against Western Carolina at 27-13 (15-6 ACC), features two consensus top-12 teams, tied for the lead in the ACC, and will go a long way toward determining the ACC regular season champion, with only nine games left in the ACC season.
The Wolfpack and Tar Heels met last Tuesday at Durham Bulls Athletic Park, and the Pack won 8-3, powered by home runs from freshman catcher Patrick Bailey and junior first baseman Evan Edwards.
NC State leads the ACC in most offensive categories, as it has all season, although after not hitting a home run last weekend against Duke, Clemson now leads the league in long balls. The Wolfpack still leads the conference in batting average, runs, slugging percentage and on-base percentage. As it has been all year, the Wolfpack is incredibly balanced one through nine in the batting lineup. On the mound, the Pack is fourth in the conference in ERA, sporting a 3.52.
After a slow start this season, UNC is third in the conference in batting average and second in runs scored. Michael Busch leads the offense, he was hitting .325 with 10 home runs and 46 RBIs entering Wednesday. As he goes, so goes the Heels offense. The Heels are fifth in the ACC with a 3.62 ERA.
The weekend series will be much different than the midweek game, because each team will use different starting pitchers.
The Wolfpack hasn’t announced its starting rotation yet, but it will likely be freshman Reid Johnston on Friday, senior Brian Brown, will throw on Saturday and a to-be-announced starter on Sunday. If graduate Johnny Piedmonte is healthy, he’ll most likely pitch on Sunday.
The Tar Heels will most likely trot out Tyler Baum, Austin Bergner and Cooper Criswell in respective order this weekend. The strength of the Heels is the bullpen, where four relievers have a 3.00 ERA or lower.
The trip to Raleigh is the biggest test of the season for UNC, who lost series to the best teams they’ve played, ECU, Louisville and Florida State, earlier in the year. The Heels have swept three ACC series against Georgia Tech, Wake Forest and Pittsburgh to make up ground on the Wolfpack.
This is the first and only of the Wolfpack’s series against ACC title contenders that will be played at Doak Field. The Pack has not lost a series all year and has gone on the road to beat Clemson and Duke, in third and fourth place in the conference. Just for good measure, the Pack also traveled to Louisville and knocked off the Cardinals.
With two series left after this weekend, it’s too soon to say the winner of this series will win the ACC, but the winner of the series will essentially have a two-game lead in the ACC standings, with the tiebreaker also in hand. A sweep for either team would give them a de facto four-game lead in the conference.
Games on Friday and Saturday will begin at 6:30 p.m. and the Sunday game will start at 1 p.m. All three games are sold out and will be broadcast on the ACC Network.
