Homerun by No. 25 UVA in 9th dooms VCU

Scott Wyant
Staff Writer
Follow The CT Sports on Twitter
——————————————————————————————————————————————

Coming into Wednesday’s match-up with Virginia, VCU held a record of 13-6 against non-conference foes.

The Cavaliers aren’t just any opponent, though; this is a UVA team that as recently as last season was ranked No. 1 in the country. They have also attended the College World Series in two of the past three years. This season was deemed a rebuilding year for UVA coach Brian O’Connor’s team. By the looks of things someone forgot to tell the Cavaliers who were ranked No. 25 coming into the mid-week game.

For most of the night VCU played even with the mighty Cavaliers. Including twice getting out of bases loaded jams infront of The Diamond’s largest crowd of the season.

“I thought the crowd was outstanding,” said Associate Head Coach Shawn Stiffler. “They gave us a boost in that middle part of the game, which really kept us in it mentally and allowed us to fight our way back into it.”

The Rams held the lead, 5-4, going into the 9^th  all be undone in that inning. VCU would head into the inning leading 5-4 but would leave the top half of the inning trailing 7-5 capped by a two-run homerun from leftfielder Derek Fisher.

The Rams would go down in order in the bottom frame falling to 22-19 overall and Virginia would improve to 28-14 on the year.

The strength of the Cavaliers showed early when Jared King led off the 2^nd inning with a double roped to left field. Followed by a double from freshman Kenny Towns to bring King home. Catcher Nate Irving would end up driving Towns home to give UVA the 2-0 advantage just two innings in.

Not to be outdone by the ‘Hoos timely hitting right-handed pitcher Shane Halley cruised through the first three innings without allowing a base runner.

In the bottom of the fourth with two men on base Sophomore Chris Ayers stepped into the batters box hoping to get the Rams first hit.

Ayers was able to do more than that getting almost all of Halley’s pitch driving a triple to deep left center scoring both Brent Mikionis and Jordan Weymouth.

The fifth inning caused more trouble for the Rams as four of the first five UVA hitters reached base scoring one run. Freshman left hander Matt Lees would settle down and get out of a bases loaded jam striking out Centerfielder Brandon Downes and getting Irving to groundout.

Centerfielder Bill Cullen got things going in the six singling to left extending his hit streak to 16 games. Cullen would later score in a three run inning for the Rams highlighted by a Chris Ayers RBI double. The inning would give the Rams a 5-4 lead they would hold going into the top of the 9^th.

The sophomore designated hitter had been struggling with a slump as of late but was able snap out Wednesday night.

“Tonight he took advantage of some pitches up in the zone and made great contact on them,” said Stiffler.

Ayers would finish the night 2-4 with 3 RBI’s for the Rams.

VCU will travel to ODU for a pivotal CAA weekend series as they make their push for the 2012 CAA baseball tournament.

-30-

Attendance: 3,427