Louisville baseball: Cardinals sweep weekend series with Yellow Jackets
While the Cardinals basketball team saw their season come to an end over the weekend, the Louisville baseball squad continued to see conference success with a sweep over the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets.
The Cardinals took down Georgia Tech 4-1 in their series opener Friday afternoon. With this win it marks Louisville’s fourth straight opening win and their eight straight in ACC play.
Junior pitcher Kyle Funkhouser tossed seven innings, striking out seven Yellow Jackets and allowing just the one run. The win was Funkhouser’s third on the season, bringing his record up to 3-2.
Will Smith was able to bring home two Cardinal runs himself; the first one coming off of a sacrifice fly in the 3rd inning bringing home Corey Ray and the second one coming in the 7th driving in the designated hitter Brendan McKay with an RBI single. Sophomore Corey Ray also added an RBI along with senior Sutton Whiting.
This win pushed Louisville up to 9-1 in conference play. Sutton Whiting also extended his hitting streak to 10 games.
The Cards continued to sting the Yellow Jackets with an 8-3 win in the second game of the series on Saturday. Corey Ray drove in half of the Cardinal runs with a career high 4 RBI guaranteeing the series win.
With this win Louisville extended its ACC winning streak to 9 games. This is also Louisville’s 9th win in 10 games. The Cards also set a season high with a total of 8 stolen bases as a team. That is the most as a team since 2013.
Freshman Brendan McKay had a nice showing on the mound for Louisville. McKay struck out 7 hitters in 7 innings while allowing only 2 runs. McKay grabbed his fourth win of the season staying unblemished in the loss column.
Cardinal pitcher Josh Rogers won his 3rd straight start to cap off the series sweep with conference foe Georgia Tech. With a 4-1 win Louisville won its 10th straight ACC conference game and is 11-1 overall. This marks the best 12 game start in school history.
Josh Rogers tossed 6 strong innings striking out 6 and allowing just the 1 run. Rogers moves to 4-1 on the season with a nice 3-0 in the ACC. Rogers has been on a nice streak in his past 5 outings boasting a nice 1.15 ERA in 31 innings pitched.
With RBIs coming from Cardinal hitters Mike White, Brendan McKay, and Nick Solak Louisville continued to hit the ball well. Catcher Will Smith also scored on a wild pitch giving Louisville its 4 runs for the game.
Sutton Whiting was able to extended his on-base streak to 12 straight conference games. Louisville improved to 21-7 on the season and 15-3 when playing at home in Jim Patterson Stadium. The Cards have also won 10 of their last 11 games.
The Cardinals improved to 11-1 in ACC play, and are getting ready for a midweek duel with Miami (OH) tonight. First pitch is scheduled for 6 ET.