ACC Baseball Tournament Preview with Stuart Barefoot:N.C. State vs. North Carolina will raise the curtain on Tuesday at 11am

Special to GreensboroSports.com from Stuart Barefoot, UNCG-grad and baseball guru….

The 2014 ACC Baseball Tournament in Greensboro will begin when the 10th seeded N.C State Wolf Pack face off against the Seventh seeded North Carolina Tar Heels for the first of two play in games. The other will be between Eighth seeded Wake Forest and Ninth seeded Georgia Tech, who plays at 3 pm on Tuesday.

The Wolf Pack narrowly made the tournament. With their status up in the air, they swept a double header against Virginia Tech on Friday to clinch a tournament spot before falling to the Hokies in their season finale. The last time they faced the Heels was in Omaha last year when UNC ended their season by thumping them 7-0. For some reason, the rivals did not play each other in the regular season.(State and Carolina were supposed to play a ‘non-conference’ game at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park, but the game got rained out.)

Whichever teams wins, will join Pool B.

The winner of the Wake Forest and Georgia Tech game will enter pool A. The way the pool format works, is each team will play against each of their three opponents in their pool. By Sunday, the teams with the best records from each pool will meet in the title game on Sunday

Pool A
Miami earned the top overall seed and share a pool with fourth seeded Duke and fifth seeded Clemson and the winner between Wake Forest and Georgia Tech.
1. Miami (40-15, 24-6)- The Hurricanes earned the top overall seed when they edged UNC 2-0 on Saturday. Their 24 conference wins ties a conference record, shared with the 2006 Clemson squad and FSU who did so in 2008 and 2012.
4. Duke (32-23, 16-14) Much like their football team, the Blue Devils Baseball team had an historic season. After closing out the regular season with a 7-5 win over FSU, it marked the first time they had won in Tallahassee since 1994 and tied a school best 16 conference wins, also a record that stood since 1994.
5. Clemson (34-22, 15-14) The Tiger bring the five seed into tournament play and ended their season in dramatic fashion. Down 9-2 in the seventh, Clemson rallied, to beat Boston College 10-9 on Saturday and stay above .500 in conference play. The Tigers, who are ranked 25th in the nation still have hopes at making the NCAA tournament.

Pool B.
2. Florida State ( 41-14, 21-9) The Seminoles nabbed the two seed and await the winner of UNC-State. The Noles are ranked fourth in the nation and join Virginia as the only two Top-10 ACC teams. Of course, the team also features famous Jameis Winston. The embattled two-sport star, however, has returned from suspension for stealing Crab Legs. Winston served mainly as the FSU closer this season.
3. Virginia (43-11, 22-8) Despite finishing ranked second in the nation, The Cavaliers earned the third seed in the ACC tournament, after losing their first three game series of the season to Wake Forest this past weekend. It was the first conference series they lost sine April 2013
6. Maryland (34-19, 15-14) The Terps will be playing in their final ACC tournament and ended regular season conference play by sweeping Notre Dame and Pittsburgh, who both missed the ACC tournament.

Curiously, Maryland will wrap us regular season play on Tuesday against West Virginia before heading to Greensboro on Thursday to begin tournament play.

3 thoughts on “ACC Baseball Tournament Preview with Stuart Barefoot:N.C. State vs. North Carolina will raise the curtain on Tuesday at 11am

  1. Should be a great game. I’m guessing both will pitch their aces in this game. We State fans would rather beat Orange County Tech at anything rather than eat ice cream on the 4th of July.

    It is a real shame that these two rivals do not meet in a series during the season. The idiots in the ACC leadership who have pushed for throwing out everything and just expanding are costing the teams in the ACC money and fans.

  2. Unfortunately we will not see Rodon in this one. He pitched on Friday and so did Carolina’s ace.

  3. It does not matter if Rodon pitched yesterday. He will throw in the game. We have seen it over and over.

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