NC State baseball (15-8, 4-4 ACC) completed its series sweep over No. 12 Georgia Tech (16-9, 4-5 ACC) on Sunday afternoon with a 6-1 victory at Doak Field at Dail Park.
The result extended the Wolfpack's win streak to four, and it has now won five of its last six games. Additionally, this is the team's first series sweep over a ranked opponent since May 14-16, 2021, at No. 16 Pittsburgh.
NC State's offense combined for 10 hits on Sunday, highlighted by multi-hit performances from
Tommy White and
Payton Green who both went 2-for-4 at the plate with a home run apiece. Green's home run was his second of the weekend and fourth of the year, while White ranks second in the NCAA with 12 home runs.
For the third-straight game of the series, Georgia Tech got on the board first when Tim Borden II sent a leadoff home run over the left field wall in the third inning to take a 1-0 lead. This was starting pitcher
Logan Whitaker's first run of the year he had given up, as he went 15.0 innings in four starts without allowing a run to score.
The Pack threatened in the fourth and fifth innings, looking to bring the game-tying run across home plate. In the fourth JT Jarrett reached on a fielder's choice and
Will Marcy doubled to left field to put runners on second and third, but Georgia Tech managed to get out of the inning unscathed. In the fifth Cozart tried to score from second on
LuJames Groover III's single up the middle after drawing a leadoff walk, but he was called out on the play at home to end the inning.
NC State took its first lead of the game in the sixth, plating a pair of runs to go up 2-1.
Josh Hood and White started the frame with back-to-back singles, and after a wild pitch put them in scoring position Jarrett pulled off the squeeze play to allow Hood to knot the score at 1-1. Another wild pitch in the inning brought White home for the go-ahead run.
In the eighth White and Green both homered to drive in a combined four runs and extend NC State's lead to 6-1.
Starting pitcher
Logan Whitaker tossed 5.1 innings, surrendering one run on three hits and tallying three strikeouts. Through his first four starts of the season, Whitaker has yielded just six hits and surrendered just one earned run in 18.1 innings pitched.
The trio of
Justin Lawson (1-1),
Canaan Silver and
Garrett Payne combined for the final 3.2 innings of the contest and kept the Yellow Jackets at bay, allowing just one runner to reach base.
The Pack's bullpen over the weekend was lights out, allowing just one run to score in 13 innings of work. Additionally, the bullpen did not issue a walk and tallied 20 strikeouts.
Marcy and Groover extended their reached based streaks to a team-best eleven games, and Groover extended his hit streak to a team-high eight games.
NC State will be back in action Tuesday when it travels to East Carolina for a midweek contest, with first pitch set for 6:30 p.m. at Clark-Leclair Stadium in Greenville, N.C. The game will be broadcast on ESPN+ and there will be an audio stream on WKNC 88.1 and the Varsity Network App.
https://gopack.com/news/2022/3/27/baseball-pack9-completes-series-sweep-over-no-12-georgia-tech-with-6-1-win.aspx