UNC baseball defeats UNC-Wilmington 14-2

In any baseball game, adjusting to the opponent is key, and in the fifth inning of Tuesday night’s 14-2 victory against UNC-Wilmington, that’s exactly what North Carolina did.

The inning saw four pitching changes in an effort to combat UNC-Wilmington’s strong hitting. The two teams combined to send 15 pitchers to the mound in the game.

“We got a lot of guys out of the bullpen to pitch, which is what we want to do midweek. A lot of people might wonder what we’re doing,” UNC (19-3) coach Mike Fox said. “But when we come out of the weekend and we’ve used our weekend starters, we’ve got guys that haven’t pitched.”

The Seahawks attempted to baffle the Tar Heels with a wide range of pitchers, including 5-foot-8 submarine pitcher Andrew Harnage and 6-foot-10 right-handed pitcher Jack Lane.

Yet no number of UNC-W adjustments could slow UNC’s bats.

“You just check your pitching chart and see what they got warming up and take it from there,” North Carolina outfielder Seth Baldwin said. “You watch what guys have done at bat before if you aren’t leading off, and that’s just how we approach it.”

Baldwin got things started for the Tar Heels with a home run in the bottom of the third, sailing the ball over the right-field fence.

An inning later, Jesse Wierzbicki hit a sacrifice fly to right, allowing Jacob Stallings to score the second run of the game.

The rest of the game highlighted the hitting abilities of the Tar Heels, as the team amassed seven of their ten hits in the last five innings.

Colin Moran led the way for the Tar Heels with six RBIs, including his two-run homerun in the fifth frame that brought home Levi Michael.

“I just saw the ball pretty well and put a swing on it,” Moran said. “I thought I might have a chance.”

Yet not all runs were scored off RBIs, as Ben Bunting scored all the way from first on a stolen base and two UNC-W errors in the sixth inning.

Errors plagued both teams as UNC ended with four. Three of these came during a sloppy fifth inning that resulted in UNC-W’s only two runs.

“We were sloppy in that one inning,” Fox said. “We’ve got pitchers that are throwing the ball away at first and then a wild pitch … if you just don’t look at that one half-inning, we played alright.”

Michael was helped off the field in the sixth frame after going down on a sprint to second base after Brian Holberton sent the ball cruising away from the plate.

Team spokesperson Dave Schmidt said Michael rolled his ankle and is day-to-day.

Contact the Sports Editor at sports@dailytarheel.com.