Charlottesville, VA (cvillerightnow.com): After a successful and thrilling home debut at Disharoon Park this past Tuesday, the Virginia Cavaliers will have their first three game series of the season against one team, the Dartmouth Big Green.  The #10 Hoos are 4-3 on the year, after going 2-1 against three different squads in Ponce, Puerto Rico on Valentines Weekend, and 1-2 against three more different teams in Round Rock, Texas last weekend.  Last time out, they bested a talented SOCON opponent in the VMI Keydets in a 6-4 thriller that featured a mammoth grand slam by Juco-transfer designated hitter Chris Arroyo, and the first inning of work from last year’s ace Evan Blanco, who is rehabbing from a lengthy injury, and is expected to be back at full strength soon.   

For now, the weekend rotation remains the same in composition though different in order. Jay Woolfolk goes on Friday.  Tomas Valincius will go on Saturday.  The freshman has been the surprise of the year so far on the mound, has dominated in two stellar starts so far, notching a victory, 16 strikeouts, and only two walks in 12 innings pitched this year.  Bryson Moore, who has also had an excellent start to the year, striking out 12 and pitching to the tune of a 1.69 ERA in his two starts, goes on Sunday.   

On the offensive side, slowly but surely Virginia’s bats are waking up.  Chris Arroyo has started strong, leading the squad in homers and RBI, Aiden Teel has also come up in some big spots and has a long ball of his own, and Eric Becker has been a powerful and steady table-setter in the leadoff spot.  However, core contributors on last year’s team, like Luke Hanson, Harrison Didawick, Henry Ford, and Jacob Ferrence have yet to make their presence known through seven games.  A great deal of travel and varied opponents throughout the season’s first slate will mostly, but not entirely, explain their issues away, but it is a long season, and a three-game set at home may be just the ingredient necessary to kickstart an offense that began the year ranked second in the nation.  After all, hitting a baseball is the hardest thing to do in sports, and a few of Virginia’s hitters seem to be a bit in between on their timing despite some long, patient, at-bats.   

Their opponents this weekend will be a Dartmouth team yet to notch its first win of the year.  The Big Green also is yet to play a game at home this season, with an extremely difficult turn of luck in the scheduling department.  Before tangling with the Hoos, they dropped a tight, high-stress, squeaker of a series to the #16 Texas Longhorns.  They were swept, but 0-3 is quite deceptive, two of the three games were one-run defeats, 4-3 Texas in game one, and 3-2 Texas in game two.  They’ll be throwing freshman Bryce Loeger in game one against Virginia, who pitched four difficult innings in relief against Texas, taking the loss.   Junior Eddie Albert will oppose Valincius in game two, who threw well in four innings against Texas in game two of that series, striking out five and surrendering one run in four innings of work.  Nate Isler rounds out the rotation for game three, taking the loss in the final game against Texas surrendering only one earned run in four innings and striking out three.  All three are on the tall side for pitchers, with Loeger 6’3”, and Isler a hulking 6’6”, leading to strong velocity numbers.  These three pitchers played a large part in keeping games against a stellar Texas team close.  Elliot Krewson and Taer Rodriguez are the danger-men at the plate, along with Nico Banez in the leadoff spot.  The offense was good enough against Texas, though entirely lacking anything resembling a big hit against Longhorn pitching.  Rodriguez has the only extra base hit in three games so far for the Big Green, a double in game two.  They show good patience and pitch selection at the plate, and they are a good team at putting the ball in play rather than striking out.  It will be interesting to get a more detailed look at them over the course of three more games.   

Only one game will be carried on Newsradio WINA, today’s game will begin at 3:00 PM, and we will have 2:45 pre-game coverage.  Game two will be at 1:00pm Saturday, and the series will end at noon on Sunday for game three.  Go Hoos!