Confident Hawks Rolling, Cleaning up Details
Bullpen improvement key to UNCW’s surge
After a victory over North Carolina A&T on Sunday to earn another series victory, Dillon Lifrieri best summed it up for the Seahawks.
“Every single time coming out here, it’s business,” he said. “We have a plan; we go to the plan. It doesn’t work out one day, we stick to it the next day — it’s just business.”
That methodical approach has UNCW (18-10, 9-3 CAA) rolling, winners of 14 of its past 18 games behind a dominant offense and an improved bullpen.
A few observations on the Seahawks ahead of their weekend showdown with first-place Elon.
This Week’s Box Scores
Tuesday: UNCW 9, ECU 3
Friday: UNCW 13, A&T 3
Saturday: A&T 4, UNCW 3
Sunday: UNCW 8, A&T 4
Trust Your Stuff
Every call to the UNCW bullpen over the first 10 games of the season was an adventure.
The biggest issues were self-inflicted for the relievers over that stretch, allowing 44 runs — only 35 earned — over 45.1 innings, due in large part to 36 walks and hitting 10 batters with a pitch. Add in 14 wild pitches, and good teams that didn’t need any help were getting way too much for free.
It’s not coincidence that the Seahawks’ fortunes changed when the bullpen started improving, which has been an incremental process starting in early March.
“The biggest thing for me is they haven’t quit working,” UNCW coach Randy Hood said. “They’ve worked hard during practice, they’ve worked hard on the daily throwing. We’ve made a lot of adjustments from command standpoint. When we’re throwing strikes, those guys have good stuff.”
This past week, the bullpen went from simply trying to keep the Hawks in games, to going out and winning them.
Over four games, UNCW relievers allowed four runs — three earned — on 11 hits with 14 strikeouts and four walks in 18.2 innings.
Luke Craig earned wins over East Carolina and A&T thanks to 7.2 dominant innings, allowing only one run on two hits.
After struggling with his command early this season, Craig has settled in as UNCW’s most consistent bullpen arm to get to closer Brett Banks.
“It’s just confidence,” Craig said. “We all know our stuff is good; we just had to get in a groove, (and) we’re in a groove. It was little mental; everyone was kind of overthinking.
“I think we all just took a step back, calmed down and now we’re going out there and we’re pitching like ourselves.”
Banks, whose incredible potential had only been limited by walks thus far, has made strides with his command over the past month, walking just three batters over his past five appearances. He’s worked 10 innings in that span, striking out 12 while giving up two earned runs.
ECU’s ESPN+ commentary team was impressed not only with Banks’ performance, but the fact that he just “looks likes a closer” thanks to his velocity and mentality to just attack batters and dare them to catch up.
“I think earlier in the year when we were struggling a little bit, we walked too many guys, we gave too many free bases,” Hood said. “When we pitch ahead and pitch to contact, we’re going to be fine. Proud of those guys, the way they work and proud of (Pitching) Coach (Kelly) Secrest, the work he puts in and the time he puts in with them.”
Championship Sundays
After Saturday’s loss, UNCW’s bats started out relatively quiet on Sunday as A&T jumped ahead 3-2 in the fourth inning.
More importantly for Coach Randy Hood, the Seahawks themselves were quiet.
‘Championship Sunday’ has been a staple for UNCW under Hood, as it usually marks the day for winning a series, a CAA title or even an NCAA Regional.
“We kind of brought them together in the fifth inning. I didn’t think we had what we call ‘Championship Sunday’ energy,” Hood said. “I think we were just kind of going with the flow each inning.”
After that, Jac Croom gave the Hawks a massive boost with his leadoff homer in the sixth, jumpstarting a six-run, four-hit rally to close things out.
The emphasis on finishing strong seems to be working for the Seahawks this season, as they’ve won five straight Sunday game after dropping the first of the season to No. 19 Virginia on Feb. 19.
UNCW has outscored opponents 51-21 in those five Sunday victories, and played mostly clean defense, committing a total of three errors.
Championship Sunday isn’t just a coaching buzzword — it’s a real thing developing for this team.
Record by day: Tuesday (2-2), Wednesday (1-0), Friday (6-2), Saturday (4-5), Sunday (5-1).
Mixers or Straight Shots
Over the four games last week, the Seahawks hit .328 as a team and put up 33 runs, and while they hit seven homers and had six doubles, 32 of the 45 hits were singles.
This team has found a good formula for when to swing for the fences, and when to play a little small ball, as it did several times this week.
A three-run seventh at ECU was fueled by three singles, two walks, a sacrifice bunt and a sacrifice fly, and on Friday, singles were responsible for driving in seven of UNCW’s runs.
And then a couple dudes are just raking, too.
Stats for the four games:
Alec DeMartino: 6 for 12 with a homer, seven runs scored, two RBI and four walks.
John Newton: 8 for 14 with a double and an RBI.
Tanner Thach: 5 for 18 with two homers, six RBI and five runs scored.
Dillon Lifrieri: 5 for 19 with a homer and four RBI.
No Margin for Error
After putting up 19 runs on 13 hits Friday, the Hawks just couldn’t catch a break on Saturday, scoring three runs on four hits.
UNCW batters made some contact, but on a windy day at Brooks Field, they just couldn’t find a gap.
A perfect example of’ ‘That’s baseball.’
There was certainly a lesson for the Seahawks though, as Hood pointed out in his postgame comments.
When the offense is rolling, the details might not matter as much, but on Saturday, the freebies were the difference in the game. An A&T batter that was hit by a pitch was the first run of the game, while the second got on base due to an error. The Aggies’ third run got on with another HBP, then advanced to second on a passed ball and scored on a double.
Of A&T’s four runs, three were put on base by the Seahawks.
UNCW is trending up on the mistakes, but this one should serve as a good reminder about the importance of every play.
The Seahawks are 8-1 when they don’t commit an error, 8-4 when they have one error, and 2-5 when they commit two errors or more.
Next Up
UNCW makes the trek to Elon, where the Phoenix (19-9, 10-2) sit in first place thanks to sweeps vs. Monmouth and Delaware and series victories vs. Towson and Northeastern.
It’ll be a strength vs. strength matchup, as Elon leans on a pitching staff with a 3.55 ERA and 1.27 WHIP. All three weekend starters have an ERA below 3.00 and a WHIP below 1.19.
That’s not to say the Phoenix can’t hit, because they’re pretty formidable at the plate, too, averaging 6.9 runs per game.
While UNCW is idle in the midweek, Elon will play host to No. 2 Wake Forest tonight, looking to avenge a 20-0 loss to the Deacons on March 21.