Sunday saw No. 23 Virginia continue a severe slide with a 13-6 loss to Duke. The Blue Devils (16-9, 5-4 ACC) secured the sweep with the win, cruising into Charlottesville and dispatching the Cavaliers (12-10, 3-6 ACC) with relative ease — Friday’s opener was the closest game of the series and was won by a four-run margin. For the first time ever, Virginia was swept by Duke in Charlottesville.
The last time the Cavaliers were swept at home by an ACC opponent? Four years ago — a three-game series versus a ranked Notre Dame squad. Four years of prolonged success at home. Four years of solid baseball for Virginia. Now, riding a four-game losing streak and a home sweep at the hands of an unranked ACC rival, this team finds itself in unfamiliar territory — amongst the bottom four teams in the ACC standings.
“It’s not too often that a team has come in here and swept us in this ballpark in the last couple of decades,” Coach Brian O’Connor said. “This game can humble you in a hurry.”
Humbling is a perfect way to describe this weekend for the Cavaliers, who will almost certainly find themselves unranked in the next poll despite beginning the year as the preseason No. 2 team in the nation.
Sunday’s loss came thanks primarily to the struggles on the mound for Virginia. Junior pitcher Evan Blanco, the Cavalier ace who is still fully working his way back from injury, surrendered five runs in two innings of work, forcing the bullpen to enter the game early and putting the offense in a tough position.
Blanco’s struggles returning from injury are a small piece of a larger problem for Virginia, but getting him back to full strength would be a huge boost for a rotation that has struggled to provide extended quality starts. Blanco, who recorded the loss, says he feels good as he goes through the motions of pitching but acknowledges that his execution needs to improve.
“It just comes down to getting my execution back to where it was at the end of last season,” Blanco said. “I think I’m in a great place mechanically — it just comes down to execution and, you know, the in game reps.”
Despite the loss, Sunday was the best showing for the Cavalier bats in the series. Virginia scored six runs, including two in the first inning to quickly tie Duke following a rough first frame for Blanco.
The struggles continued for the Cavalier pitchers through four innings, as they allowed six runs, but they appeared to settle down in the middle innings — until the seventh, when the Blue Devils posted a six-run frame driven primarily by a string of doubles. Junior pitcher Jack O’Connor entered to pitch at the start of the inning but recorded just one run, allowing all six runs and yielding the mound to senior pitcher Matthew Buchanan.
The inning transformed a 6-5 game into a 12-5 blowout, a product of the strain placed on the Virginia bullpen. O’Connor was forced to use six pitchers in the game — five pitchers contributed Saturday, and another six pitched Friday, a fitting illustration of the challenges faced by a bullpen forced to cover the majority of all three games in the series.
To their credit, the Cavalier offense did its part for most of the game, rallying in the fifth and sixth innings to cut the deficit to one run. In the fifth, sophomore infielder Henry Ford drove in a run with a single and junior utility player Chris Arroyo added another on a sacrifice fly. An inning later, Arroyo tallied another RBI with a single.
The seventh inning proved to be a crushing blow, creating an insurmountable deficit for an offense that has not shown the ability to put together big innings at critical junctures. Expectations are high for an offense returning much of the record-setting lineup of last year, but the bats have not been up to the challenge thus far.
“There were huge expectations on this team, and there were also huge expectations on individuals,” O’Connor said. “It’s a growth opportunity for them, it’s part of why they come to college, it’s part of why they have this experience.”
Sunday’s loss continues an abysmal stretch for Virginia — four consecutive losses, all by four runs or more. The goalposts have shifted dramatically, from hosting a regional round in the College World Series to simply making the playoffs. Still, opportunities abound for the Cavaliers to get back on track, starting with a midweek game on the road versus Liberty and a subsequent home series against Stanford.
“It certainly was a tough week, for sure, but you tell them that you just gotta hang in there,” O’Connor said. “You stay positive and you continue to bring energy to the field every day — I believe that it comes back your way.”
An ACC series win at home could do wonders for Virginia’s confidence. The Cavaliers will get that opportunity this weekend — they need to make the most of it.
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