No. 24 Pirates take on No. 1 Tar Heels at Clark-LeClair tonight

East Carolina looks to earn first victory over in-state rival since 2002

It was Keith LeClair’s final season when East Carolina captured its last victory over in-state rival North Carolina on the diamond.

Since a walk-off walk gave the Pirates a 2-1 win over the Tar Heels on April 17 th, 2002 at Harrington Field—the Pirates’ former home, they have lost nine straight to Mike Fox-coached teams. However, the programs didn’t meet during the 2004, 2006 and 2008 seasons.

When the schools met 15 days ago in Chapel Hill, the second-ranked Tar Heels took a narrow 3-1 win over the then 14th-ranked Pirates.

Freshman lefty Patrick Somers worked six innings and pitched beautifully in his starting debut for East Carolina.

However, Tar Heel sophomore righthander Patrick Johnson stole the show by no-hitting the Pirates through the first 6.1 innings before having it broken up by a Devin Harris single.

While Johnson was putting up zero after zero, the Tar Heels took advantage of Pirates miscues to plate two runs in the third and another in the seventh.

Trailing 3-0 and down to its final three outs, East Carolina began to mount a rally against the Tar Heel bullpen. After Garrett Davis walked Devin Harris and Jared Avchen, Tar Heel coach Mike Fox inserted Logan Munson. Munson allowed back-to-back singles to Austin Homan and Dustin Harrington, which cut the deficit to 3-1. However, rather than the bases being loaded with no outs, Cam Freeman—who was running for Homan—got hung up between second and third. This provided the Tar Heels with the elusive first out and next batter Trent Whitehead rolled into a game-ending 4-6-3 double play.

After consecutive losing weeks and several close losses, East Carolina hopes that its 10-9 comeback win over No. 27 ( Ping) Elon on Tuesday night will prove to be a turning point in its season.

The Pirates (29-12) fell behind 6-0 after Elon pushed five across in the top of the second. However, East Carolina began to chip away and it knotted the game at seven through six after posting back-to-back three spots in the fifth and sixth frames.

ECU took the lead in the bottom of the seventh when Drew Schieber scored on Trent Whitehead’s sacrifice fly down the left field line, but the Pirates were forced to come from behind a second time after Elon pushed back in front with a two-run, two-out double in the top of the ninth.

With the bases juiced, Brandon Henderson tied the game at nine and clean-up hitter Kyle Roller proceeded to deliver his third game-winning hit. Roller, who finished the night 3-of-6 at the plate with 4 RBI, also hit his team-leading 11 th homerun. The left-handed hitting junior’s 50 RBI are also tops on the team.

Brandon Henderson, who leads the team with his .423 average, extended his hitting streak to seven.

The Pirates will tangle with a Tar Heels’ team that is ranked anywhere from No. 1 to No. 4 after sweeping No. 7 Miami in Chapel Hill last weekend.

UNC-CH (32-10) won its fifth straight on Tuesday night when it overcame a 4-0 deficit to beat in-state foe UNCW, 7-5, in Chapel Hill. The Seahawks surged ahead with a four-spot in the top of the fifth, but the Tar Heels responded with six of their own. Dustin Ackley and Mark Fleury hit three-run homers. Fleury finished the night 3-of-3.

Ackley, the Tar Heels’ junior first baseman, went 2-of-4 with a double in the first meeting against the Pirates. Kyle Seager also had two hits in that contest and drove in two runs.

The North Carolina line-up features four regulars batting .330 or higher. The Tar Heels are hitting .309 as a team and have an eye-opening 22 triples to go with 44 home runs and 79 doubles.

Third baseman Kyle Seager leads the club with his .404 mark and has a team-high 20 doubles.

Two-time All-American Dustin Ackley is hitting .395 with 12 home runs.

Catcher Mark Fleury (.333) is third with eight home runs and has driven in the most runs on the squad (44).

Freshman second baseman Levi Michael, who has started all 42 games, is second on the team in home runs (10) and RBI (38).

Starting shortstop Ryan Graepel, who played at Greenville Rose High School, is hitting .279 and is third on the team with 11 doubles.

The Tar Heels will start sophomore righty Patrick Johnson (2-0, 2.11), who delivered his career-best performance on April 7 th against the Pirates. The opposition is hitting just above the Mendoza line (.203) against Johnson, who will be making his fifth start.

East Carolina, who started freshman Patrick Somers in the first game, will counter with another freshman lefty. Kevin Brandt (5-1, 4.30), who will be making his fourth start, went 6.2 innings last Wednesday in the Pirates’ 7-0 shutout of NC State. He allowed just three hits while strikeout out four and walking three.

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Final Prediction and Analysis

No one has shut the potent East Carolina line-up down the way the Tar Heels did in their 3-1 win on April 7 th in Chapel Hill. UNC-CH pitching held the Pirates to season-lows in runs (1) and hits (4) while recording 15 outs via strikeouts.

With temperatures in the low 60’s as opposed to the mid 40’s and the forecast calling for a significant amount of wind, the conditions will be better for the hitters this time around.

Each team has also had a look at the opposing team’s starter, but Brandt only saw 1.2 innings of work in game one.

While there will be more runs than the first time, don’t be surprised if Johnson and Brandt engage in a pitcher’s duel.

Offensively, East Carolina must cut down on strikeouts and force the Tar Heel defensive to make plays.

Defensively, the Pirates can’t commit four errors like in the first meeting and expect to notch the victory over the nation’s top-ranked team.

Johnson will pitch well again, but the East Carolina bats will do enough to allow Brandt to notch his sixth victory in front of a large, hostile crowd of 5,000-plus at Clark-LeClair Stadium.

East Carolina 6 North Carolina 4