The No. 14 Virginia baseball team was swept by No. 6 Florida State over the weekend in a three-game series, capped by nearly identical losses in a Sunday doubleheader. The Seminoles beat Virginia in both games Sunday by an identical score of 3-2, both on 10th-inning, one-out, walk-off contact in which Florida State freshman Luke Smierciak scored the winning run after getting hit by a pitch to open the inning in each game.
During the first game Sunday, Florida State loaded the bases against sophomore pitcher Matt Packer with Smierciak, a fielding error by Packer and a single before Florida State senior Jack Rye singled up the middle to score the winning run. In the final game of the series, it was Cavalier junior Michael Schwimer who hit Smierciak to start the 10th and faced Seminole freshman Tyler Holt with the winning run, Smierciak again on third. Holt grounded to sophomore shortstop Greg Miclat, whose throw home barely missed nabbing Smierciak at the plate, yielding the second straight walk-off loss.
In the opening game of the series Friday night, the story was quite different, as Florida State torched Virginia junior starting pitcher Jacob Thompson on its way to defeating the Cavaliers 10-3. Thompson was knocked for seven runs, six of them earned, off 11 hits and five walks in 6.1 innings, for his first loss since June 4, 2006.
Though this game marked his first loss of the season, this was the second poor outing of 2008 for Thompson. The first came March 14 against Duke, when he allowed six earned runs on eight hits in three-plus innings in a no-decision loss by a score of 9-8. The six runs allowed in both games set a new career-high for Thompson, as did the 11 hits allowed to Florida State.
With the loss, Thompson's ERA dropped to 3.59, one year after he recorded an 11-0 record with a 1.50 ERA and received first-team All-American honors in 2007.
Virginia returns home this week for two midweek games against Longwood Tuesday and Liberty Wednesday before another ACC road series against Maryland this weekend.
--compiled by Paul Montana
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