ACC Baseball News & Notes

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The Atlantic Coast Conference baseball season enters its third weekend of play this week. Plenty is going on league-wide so, here is some of what is happening in the conference.

Non-conference play has been very good to the ACC. Last week alone the league won 15 of the 20 non-conference games they were in. For the year to date, the league has a solid record of 136-51 (.727). Five teams find themselves in several polls this week. N.C. State, Louisville, North Carolina, Clemson, and Florida State are those schools in these polls. North Carolina State (19-1) were ranked #1 in the Collegiate Baseball Ranking for the first time. The Wolfpack took two of three last weekend from the Seminoles to vault themselves to the number one position. State has shown an ability to come back in games this season. Of its nineteen wins so far, they have come back to win in eleven of them. In six of those contests, they have been behind after the six innings. The Wolfpack have used their twenty-seven outs per game very well.

Louisville (16-4) is coming off a road series sweep of Duke. It marks the ninth time since joining the conference in 2015 they have been able to pull this off. They trail N.C. State in the standings heading into this weekend games. This could be a two-team race for the top spot in their division.

The ACC Player of the Week had quite a weekend for himself. Wake Forest OF Chris Lanzilli had sixteen runs batted in vs Boston College. He hit .444, with three home runs, and three doubles. On Sunday afternoon, Lanzilli put on a show with the bat. He had a two home run, ten RBI performance against the Eagles pitching staff. For the season, Lanzilli leads the conference in runs batted in with 32, home runs with 12, doubles with 10, at-bats 90, and is seventh in slugging percentage at .667.

The Pitcher of the Week is Jason Parker of North Carolina State. His last time out vs Florida State, Parker went seven shutout innings (a career best) and struck out ten in the Wolfpack 16-0 win over the Seminoles. He allowed only five hits, all singles to lowered his ERA to 0.68. Parker has struck out 26 hitters in 26.1 innings of work. He has also only given up two extra-base hits this season and none in league play.

If there is a freshman to keep an eye on, it could be Boston College’s Sal Frelick. He leads the league in stolen bases with thirteen and is second in batting average at .403. Since the season began, Frelick has been hitting at the top of the Eagles order and is doing a nice job at that.

Michael Guldberg of Georgia Tech leads the ACC in batting with a .515 average. He also leads in hits with 35, is second in sac bunts with four, and is third in on-base percentage at 0.547.

On the hill, the conference has some pretty good arms getting things done. For instance, there’s Reid Detmers of Louisville. He leads in innings pitched with 33.2 innings, batters struck out with fifty and is number one in batters struck out looking with fifteen. Hitters are hitting just .124 against him and that is ninth best in the ACC. Reid has four wins so far good enough for second in the conference.

Nick Vickers of Virginia Tech is tied for the lead in opposing batting average, ERA, and runs allowed with zero. He has company in Cameron Coller of N.C. State. He is also tied in ERA and runs allowed with zero. Both are showing ace-like numbers in the early going.