Moran finishes off Clemson

Sophomore Chris Munnelly opened the North Carolina baseball team’s series finale Sunday against Clemson with a little more than just his go-to pitches.

He also added to the Tar Heels’ recent streak of first-inning slipups.

For the seventh game in a row, UNC fell behind early and relied on an offensive answer to seal a sweep of No. 17 Clemson.

But this time that answer came in the bottom of the ninth inning.

Freshman Colin Moran gave the No. 10 Tar Heels their 5-4 victory when he drove a ground ball through the middle of the diamond to score junior Levi Michael.

“He’s a good hitter, probably the best hitter on our team,” Michael said. “I had all the confidence in the world in him. I knew he was going to drive me in, so it was good timing — him being at the plate at the right time.”

Moran’s game-winning RBI was his seventh of the weekend and the second time the freshman third baseman was the difference maker for North Carolina. UNC earned its 9-5 win Saturday with a helping hand from Moran, who drove in a pair of runs in the Tar Heels’ eight inning push to take a lead.

Like Patrick Johnson on Friday and Kent Emanuel on Saturday, Munnelly started slow on Sunday and allowed the Tigers (14-12, 4-8 ACC) to gain momentum early with two quick runs.

True to his predecessors’ form, Munnelly too settled down to find the strike zone after North Carolina’s offense gave the righty confidence to push UNC (26-4, 10-2) through two easy 1-2-3 innings and four scoreless frames.

A confident batting lineup soothed all of Munnelly’s pitching woes once catcher Jacob Stallings drove in UNC’s first run that was followed by a costly Clemson error and two more runs.

But the 3-2 lead wasn’t exactly what UNC coach Mike Fox was hoping for in the team’s effort to win the first inning.

“We’ve got to break this trend,” Fox said. “If it turns into wins on the other end, you know, I may overlook it, but we can’t continue with that. We were behind all three games, and it’s good of our guys to just keep playing.”

Although Munnelly didn’t match the career-high 11 strikeout performance of Johnson in UNC’s 13-3 rout of Clemson in game one, the righty did set the pace for the bullpen to take the reins in the top of the sixth, where the Tigers began their comeback.

North Carolina took advantage of its strong defensive play and kept Clemson to an inefficient four runs on 12 hits, as the Tigers managed to tie the ball game in the eighth inning.

“You’ve got to give credit to our pitchers really bearing down when they’ve got runners in scoring position,” Michael said. “We played good on the defensive end too, so that always helps.”

The win marks just the third time in school history that UNC has swept three ACC foes in consecutive series.

“It’s not something you really plan on in this league, but we’ll certainly take it,” Fox said. “We were on the other end of that last year a few times, so we know how it feels both ways and this way it feels better.”

Contact the Sports Editor at sports@dailytarheel.com.