The Panthers baseball team opened a must win series last night with a 7-2 win over the William and Mary Tribe. Georgia State and William and Mary entered play at 13-11 both sitting out of the tournament. The loser of the series can rest assured they will not be visiting Brooks Field in Wilmington for the CAA Championship Tournament eliminating the possibility of a trip to the NCAA Regionals.
Will Campbell set the tone for the Panthers pitching in game 1 by completing a complete game 7-2 victory. This is Will’s second complete game in his last three starts. Let’s hope winning game 1 proves big for this team as their confidence is up going into game 2.
Starting Pitching Matchups:
Game 2 – Georgia State sends senior Charley Olson to the mound who has not lost a decision since April 2nd. He is 3-0 in his last five starts. On the season he is 5-3 with a 3.36 ERA. During CAA play Charley has posted a 3-1 record with a 3.42 ERA. CAA batters are hitting .295 against him and he has a 1.34 WHIP in 52.2 innings. Charley’s last outing was against UNC-Wilmington where he did not factor in the decision after pitching 5.2 innings allowing 7 hits and 4 walks for 3 runs (2 earned). Charley is facing a much less potent offense in William & Mary so I expect to see his WHIP number around his average instead of near 2.0 as it was against UNCW. The W&M starter is Logan Billbrough. Logan has been the ace of the Tribe pitching staff in 2011. He has a 6-2 record with a very respectable 2.53 ERA. He is a strikeout machine with 85 fanned in 81.2 innings pitched and accumulated a WHIP of just 1.11. In addition, Logan has 3 complete games under his belt this season so the guy can eat innings when pitching well. His CAA stats are a 4-2 record with a 2.82 ERA and 2 complete game shutouts. Logan is one of the CAA’s top pitchers this season with the lowest ERA among all starting pitchers and 2nd in the league in strikeouts. Logan’s last outing was against Northeastern where he pitched 7 innings and allowed 6 hits, no runs and 11 strikeouts. Advantage: This is a toss up to me. Both pitchers pitched very well against Northeastern yet Logan Billbrough was roughed up hard by UNC-Wilmington and Charley Olson pitched well against that offense. Billbrough is one of the CAA’s best but Olson isn’t too far behind and Olson is on top of his game at this point in the season. This one is going to come down to which pitcher wants the win more, the mental side of things and I cannot predict that. For the record, if this matchup came 2 months ago I would say advantage goes to Billbrough.
Game 3 – We will see Justin Malone take the mound for the series finale. Justin suffered his first loss on the season (and first in 26 appearances) last weekend against UNC-Wilmington. He is now 6-1 on the season with a 3.88 ERA. The CAA has been a little less friendly to him than out of conference foes as his ERA is a 4.94 in CAA games yet he’s managed a 2-1 record. The CAA is hitting .282 off him and he has a WHIP of 1.26. Justin’s control is outstanding, he has 3.2:1 strikeout to walk ratio. As I said, Justin lost his last outing to UNCW yet it wasn’t too bad of a pitched game. He allowed 3 runs on 5 hits in 5 innings. He was just out dueled by Tyler McSwain for the Seahawks. Justin exited the game down 3-1. W&M will start Matt Wainman. Wainman made his first weekend start last weekend against Northeastern. He pitched six innings and allowed 3 hits and 1 run. He struck out 8 and walked 1 in the process. The Tribe have used 5 starting pitchers in CAA weekend play and the team ERA in CAA play is just 3.91. Advantage: This has to go to Justin Malone because of his experience and solid play throughout the season.
Relief Pitching:
Last weekend was somewhat uncharacteristic for the Panther bullpen as they allowed 10 (of 20) earned runs in the 3 games. It’s been early April against Delaware since the pitching staff performed in such a poor manner overall. The Panthers now only have 1 non-starter with a CAA ERA below 5.00 and that is Jake Dyer. Jake is 1-0 with 5 saves through 11 appearances and a 1.46 ERA. He has 8 strikeouts and just 1 walk in 12.1 innings pitched. Nick Squeglia and Aidan Francis will need to have better outings against W&M if called upon. William and Mary have reliever Brett Koehler who has posted a 1.50 ERA and a 2-0 record with 5 saves through 12 appearances and 30 innings pitched. Opposing CAA batters are hitting only .168 against him. This is another too close to call advantage situation. Recent performance would sway the advantage to W&M but last night’s performance by that bullpen sways it back to the Panthers. The Tribe bullpen gave up 5 of the 7 Panther runs however we did not see any Panther bullpen members thanks to Campbell.
Offense:
Here is where the Panthers solid advantage can come in play IF the team can manage keep the men left on base to a minimum. We can at times be frustrated at the lack of ability to score runners in scoring position yet the Panthers are still the 2nd best offensive team in the league. The runs per game comparison is 4.8 for the Tribe and 7.2 for the Panthers. The Panthers are a more powerful team with 41 home runs and 108 doubles compared to the Tribe’s 16 home runs and 80 doubles. The Panthers also run more often and are more efficient with 83 of 109 stolen base attempts being successful. The Tribe are 61 for 90. The Tribe is hitting .268 in CAA play this season with Tadd Bower leading the team at .362 and 26 RBI’s. The Panthers are hitting their season average in the CAA at .312. Mark Micowski has his CAA average up to .400 with 21 RBI’s. He is also slugging .600. Rob Lind continues to raise his average and be menacing to CAA pitchers as he is hitting .396 with a .626 slugging percentage and an on-base percentage over .500. The clear advantage here goes to the Panthers. They have no problem getting on base, let’s make sure to bring them home boys.
The Panthers have the overall advantage because of their offensive strength. Their challenge is profiting from men reaching base, it has been all season. While the Tribe is not as strong offensively they have managed to go 6-2 in CAA series to this point and have only lost series to James Madison and UNC-Wilmington, both coming by way of sweeps. Georgia State is 4-4 in CAA series this season but has beaten James Madison and suffered the same fate as W&M against UNC-W. The loser of this series will not make the CAA tournament for sure. You better believe that Coach Frady has made the team fully aware of this. We have too many seniors that are hungry for another run in the tournament for these boys to lay down. I expect GSU to take the series, still not sure if the sweep will happen though. Assuming Billbrough goes for the Tribe today, it will be the toughest game up at W&M.
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