On a cool Friday night in front of a crowd of 1,638 at Foley Field the Diamond Dawgs smothered the Liberty Flames 12-0, posting the team’s first shutout since beating Vanderbilt 1-0 in Nashville last season. In only his fourth start, freshman pitcher Sean McLaughlin pitched a career-high six innings, gave up four hits and boasted an impressive 7:1 strikeout-to-walk ratio.
The combination of McLaughlin and the Georgia infield clamped down on Liberty by not allowing one base runner to reach third base.
“Our defense is awesome. We work really hard,” said shortstop, Kyle Farmer. “It’s all about concentration, pitchers throwing strikes and getting us ground balls. Not getting anybody past second base is pretty cool, too. It’s all about pitching; they do the most work on the team.”
Liberty freshman pitcher Carson Herndon did what he could to limit the Dawgs’ bats. However, it just wasn’t good enough, as he lasted for only 3.2 innings. During that span, Herndon surrendered three runs on eight hits, including a towering solo shot over the left center wall in the bottom of the fourth inning to freshman first baseman, Zack Bowers; his fourth home run of the season. As Bowers rounded second base, there was an exchange of words between him and Liberty second baseman Bryan Anderuud, which lead to both teams being warned by the officiating crew.
After leaving eight runners on base between the second and sixth innings, the Diamond Dawgs erupted for seven runs in the seventh inning and three runs in the eighth. Senior shortstop, Kyle Farmer lead the way on offense by contributing one run and four RBI’s, as well as hitting his 59th career double, which tied him for forth in UGA baseball history with former Georgia great, Gordon Beckham.
No matter what pitching changes the Flames made, the Georgia batters were on top of the Liberty pitchers like white on rice. In the last 1.1 innings of the game, Liberty used five different pitchers against 16 batters, but couldn’t shut down the Dawgs’ potent offense. In the victory, Georgia combined for 15 hits, while also showing patience, collecting nine walks; four of those chipped in by sophomore outfielder, Hunter Cole, alone.
Blake Dieterich, whom leads the team with a 0.50 ERA, appeared in the 7th inning and pitched two flawless innings of baseball, striking out two Liberty Flames. Ross Ripple extinguished the Flames in the top of the 9th with a clean 1-2-3 scoreless inning.
DAWGS WIN THE SERIES…
Even though the Bulldogs’ bats were not as explosive on Saturday as they were the day before, the Dawgs’ pitching staff compensated for the lack of offense. Redshirt junior pitcher, Patrick Boling did not hesitate to pick up right where he left off with another strong showing on the mound, helping guide the Diamond Dawgs to a 3-1 victory against the Liberty Flames. In the Georgia’s second straight win against Flames, Boling pitched a career high six innings, outdoing himself exactly one week later by .1 innings, not to mention he fanned five batters.
With the win, Georgia crawled back to .500 and is on the verge of their second sweep and three game winning streak of the season; that is if the Diamond Dawgs take care of business on Sunday.
“It seems like it’s been forever to get back to 500, and now we have a chance to get above that on Sunday after pitching extremely well again today,” said Georgia coach David Perno.
Senior third baseman, Curt Powell went two for three and extended his hitting streak to 10 games.
Senior pitcher, Bryan Benzor recorded the win when he took over for Boling in the seventh and eighth innings, holding the Flames scoreless. In the bottom of the eighth frame, freshman first baseman, JT Phillips hit a sacrifice fly to right field, knocking in Nelson Ward to break the 1-1 tie. One batter later, senior catcher, Brett Deloach brought home Kyle Farmer with an RBI single to left, giving Georgia a 3-1 lead; the Dawgs never looked back. Jared Walsh finished off the ninth frame, holding the final four Liberty batters scoreless.
CLOSE, BUT NO CIGAR…
The Flames (10-5) didn’t want to return to Lynchburg empty handed and it certainly appeared that way as Liberty shell-shocked the Dawgs and beat them at their own game 11-8 on Sunday. Trey Lambert of the Flames pitched 7.1 innings and gave up three runs, limiting the same Georgia team that posted a combined 15 runs in the first two games of the series. In fact, the Diamond Dawgs didn’t even touch home plate until the bottom of the eighth inning, when the game was already well out of reach.
However, this Georgia squad didn’t throw in the towel, attempting a late rally in the final two frames of the game. The Bulldogs logged eight runs, which was highlighted by a three-run triple to center field by outfielder, Hunter Cole. The two out triple cut the Flame’s lead to five in the bottom of the eighth inning, but unfortunately the damage was already done; too little, too late.
As a whole, the Diamond Dawgs’ pitching staff surely didn’t turn any heads. Georgia used five pitchers in the shellacking and not one pitcher lasted for more than two innings.
“It’s a situation where they have a good team,” said Bulldog head coach David Perno. “It’s just the way that it happened. We walked eight batters and hit three, so that’s 11 free passes and then we give up 16 hits. You can’t do that. It is part of the reason that it took us so long offensively to get going is because we’re staying on defense forever every inning. We had opportunities where we were close to breaking out all day offensively, but we just could never stop them long enough to get going.”
THE GLASS IS HALF FULL…
Although some of the attention may be shifted to the Diamond Dawgs not locking up the sweep against the Flames on Sunday, the focus should actually be on what the Dawgs did accomplish in the series.
Georgia established its ace in Sean McLaughlin, a freshman phenom whom was selected in the 38th round straight out of Northview High School by the Atlanta Braves in the 2012 MLB draft. On Opening Day, McLaughlin became the first true freshman pitcher to start since 1972; a feat that speaks volumes about the 18-years old’s skill set. As a freshman, McLaughlin has been lights out for the Bulldogs, sporting a fantastic 1.80 ERA as well as having won three of his first four collegiate starts.
Sitting at 7-8, Georgia is back to one game below .500, but is playing better than it was at the beginning of the season. However, conference play is a different beast and that is in fact, what looms in the foreseeable future for the Diamond Dawgs. Georgia will travel to College Station on March 15 to take on the Texas A&M Aggies in a three-game series.
Get your popcorn ready!
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Go dawgs!