Stubbs walks off on VCU in 10 innings

Baseball is a sport that requires speed, power, skill and attention to detail.

It is also a sport that requires just a little bit of luck, and through the first eight innings of the North Carolina baseball team’s 3-2 victory against VCU, that luck was virtually non-existent for the Tar Heels.

UNC hit the ball all over Boshamer Stadium, but seemingly every baseball found the glove of a Ram defender. As a result, UNC left a staggering 18 runners on base. Many teams would grow frustrated, but the Tar Heels stayed patient and waited for their break — which ultimately came in the form of a Cody Stubbs walkoff hit in the 10th inning.

“We hit a lot of balls hard right at them,” freshman Landon Lassiter said. “Things didn’t go our way early … (We) just got to keep a level head and keep hitting.”

UNC kept plugging away and finally found some luck in the bottom of the ninth inning.

Trailing 2-1, cleanup hitter Skye Bolt led off the inning with a bunt single. Stubbs followed suit with a bunt that was only designed to advance the speedy Bolt into scoring position.

But VCU second baseman Jordan Weymouth mishandled the ball, proceeded to throw it behind his back, past the first baseman, which allowed Bolt to motor into third and Stubbs to arrive safely at first.

Up next was Michael Russell, who drove in the game-tying run on a sacrifice fly to right-field and the Tar Heels forced their first extra inning game of the season.

After Chris McCue tossed a flawless top of the 10th inning, and with the top of the UNC order coming to the plate, Stubbs could sense his team was ready to complete the comeback.

“Every time the top of the order comes up I feel like we’re going to score a run.” Stubbs said. “We have a great chance to put at least one across, if not two or three.”

The Tar Heels only needed one to secure the victory. And after Lassiter singled up the middle, Colin Moran moved Lassiter to second on a fly out and Bolt was intentionally walked, coach Mike Fox noticed a pattern in VCU pitcher Matt Lees’ delivery as Stubbs was coming up to bat.

“If you were paying attention, and we were, every time that lefty tried to set and go fast, it was a fastball,” Fox said. “When he lifted (his leg) high, it was going to be a breaking ball.

“So Cody went to the box and said he was just going to sit on a breaking ball.”

Stubbs got his pitch and sent a line drive to right field, sending the UNC dugout into a frenzy.

“First pitch breaking ball, I was sitting on it, he threw it, and he hung it, and so that’s pretty much all she wrote.”

Contact the desk editor at sports@dailytarheel.com.