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Pitching leads UNC baseball to a sweep of Seton Hall

Carolina baseball topped seton Hall in all three games int heir opening weekend series held Friday and Saturday afternoons at Boshamer Stadium.
Carolina baseball topped seton Hall in all three games int heir opening weekend series held Friday and Saturday afternoons at Boshamer Stadium.

“We’re so confident,” said sophomore right-hander Spencer Trayner. “We’re so confident, and it’s a blast out there. Every guy that we’re gonna bring in is gonna be real good. We’re prepared for it.

“If our starter doesn’t get us to the sixth or seventh, we have the depth to take care of that. And then we have the depth in the back of the bullpen to really shut down games well.”

In UNC’s 7-1 win Friday, junior Trent Thornton had a solid but unspectacular start where he wasn’t able to go as deep into the game as he wanted — just 4.1 innings.

The right-hander allowed five hits and one run while striking out six batters and walking three. That wasn’t an issue for this UNC pitching staff, though.

Trayner came in and threw 2.2 scoreless relief innings while retiring 10 straight batters during his appearance.

“We’ve got guy after guy in the bullpen that we have all the confidence in,” Thornton said.

“I mean Spencer Trayner, Chris McCue, Reilly Hovis, Hansen Butler, I mean the list goes on and on.

“No matter who we’re running in there out of the bullpen, we have complete confidence in them.”

But it isn’t just the bullpen that’s a strength.

In Saturday’s double header, senior Benton Moss continued to be the pitcher that he’s become known to be in Chapel Hill, and freshman J.B. Bukauskas lived up to all the hype that comes with being the nation’s No. 29 right-handed pitcher.

Moss struck out nine batters and allowed just two runs in his five innings of work in the second game (a 10-4 win), and Bukauskas sealed the deal in game three (a 9-5 win). His five-inning effort featured five strikeouts and a handful of 97 mph fastballs.

“He’s just got explosive stuff, he’s got so much potential,” Moss said of Bukauskas after the double header. “It’s awesome just to watch him.”

Coach Mike Fox didn’t think the Ashburn, Va., native’s college debut could have gone any better.

“J.B. was perfect,” he said. “It couldn’t have been scripted out any (more) perfect to get him five innings ... We weren’t gonna let him throw over 90 (pitches), so we didn’t see any reason to put him out there in the sixth inning.

“But you can see the great arm he has. I think he’s only gonna get better.”

As for Bukauskas, he’s just excited to be part of a pitching staff with so many quality options. A total of 13 different pitchers threw over the weekend, and just four of them allowed earned runs.

“It feels great,” he said. “It’s way different than in high school where you only have one guy on the team like that. Here, you have 18 of them.”

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