Baseball

This Week In ACC Baseball

ACC Baseball Release: http://theacc.co/accBB2021

ACC 2021 Baseball Information Guide: http://theacc.co/21accbbGDE

• The Tuesday non-conference slate finds nine ACC teams in action. Seven games on the schedule are in-state matchups, highlighted by No. 24 Georgia Tech’s road trip to No. 20 Georgia. The Georgia Tech-Georgia game will be the first of two scheduled meetings in the rivalry this season and the 380th time the teams have met since the series began in 1898.

• The Yellow Jackets enter Tuesday night’s game having avoided a series sweep versus Florida State with a come-from-behind 9-8 win on Sunday. The victory was the 1,300th for Georgia Tech head coach Danny Hall, who became just the fourth active Division I coach to reach the milestone and 20th all-time.

• Louisville and Pitt saw last week’s scheduled head-to-head series canceled due to COVID-19 protocols within the Panthers’ program, but each currently sits atop the standings in their respective division. Louisville (14-6 ACC) leads second-place Notre Dame (18-8) in the Atlantic Division by eight percentage points. Pitt’s 14-10 ACC mark in the Coastal leads four teams currently within a game and a half – Georgia Tech (15-12), Virginia Tech (15-12), Miami (14-12) and North Carolina (14-13).

 • Six ACC teams are ranked in at least one of the six major polls this week, with Louisville a consensus top-10 selection (as high as No. 4 by Perfect Game). Notre Dame owns five top-10 rankings (as high as No. 6 by both Baseball America and Perfect Game).

• ACC Player of the Week Mat Nelson of Florida State leads the nation in both home runs (18) and RBI (53). Notre Dame first baseman Niko Kavadas' 15 home runs are tied for second-most nationally.

• Notre Dame continues to be the only ACC team that has not dropped a conference series this season, and the Fighting Irish kept that streak alive in dramatic fashion last weekend. After dropping the opening game of its series at Boston College on Friday, Notre Dame won the first game of Sunday’s doubleheader, and then trailed 9-0 in game 2 before scoring 12 runs in the eighth inning en route to a 13-9 series-clinching win. It marked the largest come-from-behind win for the Irish since 2009, when they erased a 9-0 deficit and beat St. John’s 11-10 in the Big East tournament.

• The upcoming ACC weekend schedule includes a mix of conference and non-conference games, but Pitt’s home series against Northern Kentucky has been canceled as the Panthers remain sidelined due to COVID-19 protocols.

ACC By The Numbers

2 - The ACC boasts the two leading active NCAA D-1 coaches in terms of winning percentage -- Louisville’s Dan McDonnell (.715) and Virginia’s Brian O’Connor (.702). 

3 - Three ACC teams rank in the top five nationally for most all-time NCAA tournament appearances: No. 2 Florida State (57), No. 3 Miami (46), and No. 5 Clemson (44). 

6 - The Atlantic Coast Conference has placed at least six teams in each of the last 16 NCAA tournaments.

10 - At least two ACC baseball teams have earned national seeds in each of the last 10 NCAA tournaments.

14 - At least one ACC team has reached the College
World Series in Omaha each of the previous 14 years in which it has been held, and multiple ACC teams reached the CWS nine times during that span.

26 - The ACC has placed a total of 26 teams in the past 14 College World Series, an average of just under two per season.

82 - Eighty-two (82) ACC teams have earned NCAA bids in the last 11 tournament years.

96 - The 14 current ACC teams have a combined 96 College World Series appearances.

1,100 (plus) - In Georgia Tech’s Danny Hall (1,300) and NC State’s Elliott Avent (1,132), the ACC claims the NCAA Division I’s No. 4 and No. 7 active coaches in terms of total victories.