Ballard to start for Virginia vs. Lehigh
By Jay Jenkins / Daily Progress staff writer
June 1, 2006

Virginia baseball fans, take notice. Brian O’Connor wants to hear you on Friday, but he’s not that interested in seeing you in the stands at Davenport Field until late or after the opening game of the Charlottesville Regional.
Visual contact in the early innings in a contest with Lehigh likely means Virginia’s third-year coach had to yank starting pitcher Mike Ballard off the mound.
O’Connor spends games tucked just inside the Cavaliers’ dugout and has admitted that he typically has no idea just how many fans are in the ballpark until he starts taking that dreaded walk to grab the baseball.
Ballard, a senior, knows that walk all too well. In five games this year, O’Connor pulled the southpaw before the end of the fifth inning.
“I guess it is never a good thing,” Ballard said. “It can be kind of frustrating. It just puts the end to a day.”
With a 46-13 overall record, O’Connor has not had to make that walk too many times. His team sports a 2.81 earned run average, the nation’s second-best mark. That is just points higher than last year’s impressive mark of 2.74.
The Cavs are also ranked first in shutouts (10), tied for second in opponent’s batting average (.228) and sixth in strikeouts (496).
Those numbers were not earned by coincidence. During his first day on the job some three years ago, O’Connor said Virginia’s program would be built on pitching - solid pitching.
O’Connor inherited Ballard, an eight-game winner this year, from former coach Dennis Womack, but he went out and recruited sophomore Sean Doolittle and freshman Jacob Thompson, the Nos. 1 and 2 starters for the team, respectively.
“I just believe that any championship team in baseball, at any level, you have to be able to pitch. It all starts out there,” said O’Connor. “Unless you get to a fifth game in the ACC Tournament, it is so rare that you are going to win a game 13-12.
“That guy on the mound sets the tone for the entire day. I am always going to believe that.”
O’Connor still knows the importance of scoring runs. In last year’s trip to the NCAA Tournament, UVa allowed just seven runs on the mound, but was eliminated in two days after scoring a meager four runs in 18 innings.
“Believe me, we’re going to recruit the best bats that we can recruit. There is no doubt about it,” O’Connor said. “I want to have the best offensive team, and I think this year is the best offensive team we have had in three years, and that will continue to get better as young kids develop.”
But with a lengthy background in pitching - O’Connor pitched in the College World Series at Creighton and in the Phillies’ farm system - the Cavaliers will always pitch first. Then catch. Then hit.
O’Connor used the title winner from 2005 as a prime example.
“Look at Texas,” the skipper said. “Texas won the National Championship, and they had the top ERA in the country last year. They play great defense and Texas plays a manufacture-style of baseball. They are going to bunt with anybody in their lineup and that’s what wins championships.”
With the top arms Michael Schwimer (3-1, 2.81 ERA, 57.1 IP) and Casey Lambert (10 saves, 2.68 ERA, 37 IP) in his bullpen well rested, O’Connor pondered for days about his rotation for this weekend.
With the big picture in mind, he ultimately settled on Ballard (8-3, 3.89 ERA) against Lehigh. Doolittle, the ACC Player of the Year, will take an 11-1 record and a 1.87 ERA into the second game of the regional against Evansville or South Carolina.

O’Connor said the current plan is to use Thompson in the third game, but UVa might not get that far unless Ballard sets the tone in the opener.
“We are not going anywhere,” O’Connor said, “unless Mike Ballard goes out and pitches a great start every time that he gets a chance from here on out.”
To his credit, Ballard wants the ball. He wants to move past a rough ACC Tournament start against Florida State - he allowed seven earned runs in 2.1 innings.
“I felt sharp those first couple of innings out there and then all of a sudden a time bomb went off or something,” Ballard said. “I made some bad pitches and missed some spots.”
Virginia’s pitching coach Karl Kuhn has no doubt that Ballard will bounce back.
“We talk about it all the time with our pitching staff. The most important thing is what happens next,” Kuhn said. “There is nothing more important after a bad start than your next start. Ballard is looking forward to it.”
And so is Thompson. And so is Doolittle, who even admitted that he would not put it past himself to ask for the ball later in the regional if the situation warranted it.
“I haven’t done it since I have been here, but I was known to do that in high school,” said Doolittle, a reliever last year. “I would definitely do that. I was ready to do that if they needed me in the ACC Tournament in relief.
“It never got to that point, and I didn’t even have to ask Coach O’Connor, but I would definitely do something like that.”

OPEN HOUSE: All four teams in the regional will practice today at Davenport Field. All four sessions are open to the public.
The practice order, which was determined by the seeding process, is as follows: UVa (10 a.m.-11:15 a.m.), South Carolina (11:30 a.m.-12:45 p.m.), Evansville (1 p.m.-2:15 p.m.), and Lehigh (2:30 p.m.-3:45 p.m.).

 

Hawks could be a handful
With nothing to lose, fourth-seeded Lehigh will not be a cakewalk for Virginia
By Jay Jenkins / Daily Progress staff writer
June 2, 2006

Virginia has enjoyed more than its share of special moments on the diamond during the past three years, including hosting the program’s first-ever NCAA Regional in 2004.

One of the moments that stands out to UVa pitching coach Karl Kuhn has nothing to do with something that happened between the foul lines.

After Virginia was knocked out of the NCAA Regional last year in Corvallis, Ore., Kuhn watched one of his hurlers do what he called the “classiest thing imaginable.”

The losing pitcher that day, former star Jeff Kamrath, approached Mike Ballard and offered an apology. Kamrath felt responsible from keeping his close friend from doing something he had rehabbed so long to do: pitch in the NCAA Tournament.

Ballard was to get the ball in the third game of the regional, but if and only if Kamrath had won his start.

“One of the first things Jeff Kamrath did last year after he regrouped,” Kuhn recounted, “was to go up to Michael and tell him that he was sorry that he didn’t get to pitch in the regional.”

Kamrath will finally get his wish.

Virginia coach Brian O’Connor will start Ballard in today’s opening game against Lehigh (28-26) at 3 p.m. Second-seeded South Carolina will close out the first day of the four-team, double-elimination event against third-seeded Evansville at 7 p.m.

“I know he is hungry, and when you have a veteran captain like that, that has pitched in big ball games his entire career, you want to get him the ball to get the regional started off right,” O’Connor said.

Kuhn said it is only fitting that Ballard gets the ball at Davenport Field, a place that Ballard is 6-0 this season with a 2.20 earned run average in 48.1 innings pitched. In addition to throwing a no-hitter against Boston College earlier this year, the stadium holds other memories.

As UVa opened regional play in ’04, Ballard sat on the front row with a video camera and radar gun. Ballard had company - Kamrath was also rehabbing from Tommy John surgery.

“If you can sit and listen to Jeff Kamrath for a year, you are definitely going to be a stronger person,” Kuhn joked. “Plus, Ballard had to sit there and soak it all in and watch people have some success.”

Between runs for foul balls and hot dogs, Ballard tried to remain positive. Some moments were tougher than others.

“It was just a bummer, especially early on in the season when we were begging the people in the crowd for hot chocolate,” Ballard said. “Just like we did every game that year, we were just up in the stands with the fans for the regional. It was tough.”

Some of those same fans he shared seats with will be behind Ballard today as he tries to pitch his heart out in what could be his final outing as a Cavalier. Ballard has a year of eligibility left, but he already has his degree and could leave, pending the upcoming amateur draft.

“I think he just loves pitching at home, and I think the fans love watching him pitch at home,” Kuhn said. “He is a crowd favorite. He has been here for four years and I think the adversity that he has come back from gives him the energy to pitch in this park.

“The kid has overcome a lot, and I am just proud for him and of him and proud to coach him. I am looking forward to his start.”

Like almost every member of Virginia’s team, Ballard knows very little about Lehigh. He pointed out that the Mountain Hawks made the NCAA Tournament in men’s basketball a few years ago, but knows little else about the school that does not award scholarships for baseball.

“I’m sure they are going to be a great team,” Ballard said. “They wouldn’t be in this tournament if they weren’t.”

On paper, it looks like Ballard is on target. Some of Lehigh’s numbers look scary. The Mountain Hawks have won 15 of their last 20 games, hit .297 and have 94 stolen bases.

“It seems to me that their style of play and what has gotten them here is the same thing that has made us successful,” O’Connor said.

Unlike Virginia, Lehigh coach Sean Leary said his team could play with an attitude of having nothing to lose. That comes with the territory of being seeded fourth and making the first-ever NCAA Tournament appearance in program history.

“We have no pressure,” Leary said. “Our guys were very relaxed [Thursday]. We want to be loose. We have certainly come down here to compete and to win, but outside pressures ... there really aren’t any.

While O’Connor debated his options on naming a starter in the opening game, Leary said his decision was simple - senior Kyle Collina (6-5, 4.00 ERA) will get the nod today.

“I think the only question or concern with a guy like him is that he would try to do too much for us,” said Leary, whose team won the regular-season and tournament titles in the Patriot League. “We are going to ask him to relax, and his natural ability should give us a chance to compete in this game.”

 

UVa's Ward wins player of the year
From staff reports / Charlottesville Daily Progress
June 2, 2006

The accolades just keep on coming for Virginia’s Matt Ward.

Three days after leading UVa to an NCAA Championship and being named the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player, the Oakton native was named the winner of the 2006 Tewaaraton Trophy, given annually to the top lacrosse player in the nation.

Ward led the Cavaliers with 42 goals, 25 assists and 67 points. It was the third consecutive year he led the team in goals and total points.

The recently graduated Ward, a co-captain, scored an NCAA Tournament-record 16 goals, including five in the final against Massachusetts.

This season, Ward also earned first-team All-America honors and received the Lt. Raymond J. Enners Award as the USILA’s Player of the Year.

Ward is the second Virginia player to win the Tewaaraton - Chris Rotelli won it in 2003.

Ward’s teammate, Kyle Dixon, was also up for the award. Just moments after winning the championship on Monday, Ward and Dixon talked about the possibility of continuing as teammates at the professional level.

On Wednesday, that thought became a reality when the pair was drafted by the Baltimore Bayhawks in the first round of the Major League Lacrosse Draft. Dixon was the second pick of the draft; Ward was chosen fourth.

Virginia defensive ace Michael Culver was also selected in the first round (Chicago).

UVa midfielder Matt Poskay was the second pick of the second round (Boston), while Cavaliers midfielder J.J. Morrissey was the seventh pick of the third round (Rochester).

Interestingly, Morrissey will be a teammate of Maryland’s Joe Walter’s, a Virginia nemesis the last four years. Walters was the draft’s No. 1 pick.

In all, Virginia had five players drafted. Maryland had four.

Virginia also had three former players picked – Syracuse’s Joe Yevoli and Nathan Kenny, along with Steve Holmes, a 2005 UVa graduate who was the coach at Monticello High this season.

 

Cavaliers seeking fast start
Openers in past NCAA tournaments have left them in losers' bracket
BY JEFF WHITE
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Jun 2, 2006

CHARLOTTESVILLE -- A loss today would not end Virginia's season. Better than most teams, however, these Cavaliers appreciate the significance of opening games in the NCAA baseball tournament.

"Obviously, every game's important," U.Va. coach Brian O'Connor said yesterday, "but that first game, to come out and go into the winners' bracket gives you such an advantage. Because in a tournament like this it's so tough playing with one loss."

This is O'Connor's third season at U.Va., and the third season he's guided his club to the NCAA tournament. He's still seeking his first opening-game victory in the NCAAs.

In 2004, Princeton, Vanderbilt and George Mason joined U.Va. in a double-elimination regional at Davenport Field. In its first game, U.Va. lost to Princeton. The Wahoos bounced back to win their next two games before Vandy, playing its third game, eliminated them to capture the regional.

In 2005, at Corvallis, Ore., U.Va. again dropped its NCAA tournament opener and fell into the losers' bracket. The Cavs lost their next game too, and, just like that, their season was over.

Losing the first game "puts you in a big hole," said senior Tom Hagan, the all-ACC first-team choice at designated hitter/utility. "You try not to press at the plate, but if you're down in an elimination game, you might press a little bit. And your pitching, you're going to have to use an extra starter, and when you get to that championship game -- if you make it that far -- you're going to be depleted in that sense."

Fortunately for the 12th-ranked Cavaliers, their opponent this afternoon shouldn't present an insurmountable challenge. Virginia (46-13), the top seed in this four-team regional, meets No. 4 seed Lehigh (28-26) at 3 p.m. Second-seeded South Carolina (37-22) and No. 3 seed Evansville (40-20) will follow at 7 p.m.

Lehigh, the Patriot League champion, is making its first appearance in the NCAA tournament. The Mountain Hawks' record may not be impressive, but the pitcher they'll start today -- senior Kyle Collina -- is the Patriot's all-time leader in strikeouts with 237. His battery mate, junior catcher Matt McBride, is hitting .417 and won the Patriot's player-of-the-year award.

O'Connor will start senior left-hander Mike Ballard (8-3, 3.89 earned-run average) today. Ballard lasted only 21/3 innings last Friday against Florida State, which won 11-0 to knock Virginia out of the ACC tournament, but he threw a no-hitter April 16 at Davenport against Boston College.

Ballard said he's honored to have drawn the opening-game assignment.

"I'm really excited to go out there and hopefully give our team a chance to win and get us off on the right foot," he said yesterday.

U.Va. is 31-3 at Davenport this season. The Cavaliers drew overflow crowds to their home series last month, and they can expect more support this weekend. Temporary bleachers, seating about 600, have been installed behind the wall in left field, raising Davenport's official capacity to 3,196 for the regional. Temporary seating down the right-field line was added during the regular season.

The NCAA tournament begins today at 16 regional sites. The winners will advance to eight Super Regionals, from which will come the field for the College World Series in Omaha, Neb.

"Since last fall, we've set our sights on making it to Omaha, but it all goes back to not overlooking what's right in front of you," said Hagan, who's hitting .363 with 39 RBI.

"In this case we're fortunate enough to host a regional. The hard work we put in all season gave us this opportunity to play here, and we need to take advantage of it and move on."

 

Doolittle does it all for U.Va. baseball team
Standout pitcher finds home in the middle of Cavs' batting lineup
BY JOHN O'CONNOR
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Jun 1, 2006

Best player on the team bats third and pitches. Happens all the time in Little League, and occasionally in high school.

Take that model to the ACC. It's rarer than an inside-the-park homer. But when the University of Virginia needed a key hit or a key out this season, the Cavaliers called the Doc: Sean Doolittle, a sophomore southpaw who hits (very well), pitches (even better), and answers to that nickname linked to the mythical veterinarian Dr. Dolittle.

Virginia (46-13) entertains Lehigh (28-26) tomorrow in one of 16, four-team NCAA regionals that also includes South Carolina (37-22) and Evansville (40-20). Count on heavy Doolittle involvement over the weekend, as a starting pitcher, first baseman, or designated hitter. The 2006 ACC player of the year is batting .308 with 53 RBI. As a pitcher, the New Jersey resident is 11-1 with a 1.87 ERA (103 strikeouts in 862/3 innings).

Brian O'Connor deserves a standing ovation from Cavaliers backers, and not just for three consecutive NCAA teams. U.Va.'s third-year coach made sure Doolittle, as a prep player, knew he would be given the opportunity to pitch and hit at Virginia. Other high-level college programs recruiting Doolittle projected him exclusively as a pitcher.

"That was a big conversation subject around the dinner table," said Debbie Doolittle, Sean's mother.

Doolittle had evidence that O'Connor wasn't just baiting him to secure a letter-of-intent signature. The 2004 ACC player of the year was Joe Koshansky. In O'Connor's first season as Virginia's coach, Koshansky started all 59 U.Va. games, either as a pitcher or first baseman. (He is now one of minor-league baseball's brightest prospects, a Double-A first baseman in the Colorado system who hit 38 homers and drove in 115 runs last season.)

Doolittle was very aware of Koshansky's U.Va. career.

"They had a guy doing what I wanted to do," said the 6-3 190-pounder. "I knew I would have a real hard time pitching once a week and sitting on the bench the other six days."

O'Connor was confident he signed a quality arm, and Doolittle as a freshman pitched 49 innings, mostly in relief, with a 1.64 ERA. Virginia's coach wasn't sure what Doolittle might supply otherwise, but he hit .313 as a Division I rookie with 11 homers and 57 RBI.

"From an offensive standpoint, you never know about a player until he shows up and you get a chance to see him every day perform and have at-bats. Sean grew on us very, very quickly," O'Connor said. "He gets the fat part of the bat on the ball a lot."

 

Hagan makes the most of his final UVa at-bats
The decision to focus on baseball pays off for the former Timesland athlete of the year.
By Doug Doughty
981-3129

When Tom Hagan was 12, he and his Little League teammates were given a tour of Salem Memorial Baseball Stadium, and they got to hit against the pitching machines located beneath the stands.

As legend has it, then-Salem Avalanche manager Bill "Moose" McGuire got one look at Hagan's left-handed stroke and told him, "Son, whatever you do, don't let anybody touch that swing."

Hagan confesses to a few alterations over the years, but he has taken the same basic swing he had in the Cave Spring National Little League and used it to become a first-team All-ACC selection and a .326 hitter over the his four-year career at Virginia.

There was talk of Hagan having grounds for a hardship appeal that would have made him eligible for a fifth year, but he will conclude his career in the NCAA tournament, which begins today in Charlottesville, where Virginia (46-13) entertains Lehigh (28-26) at 3 p.m.

"Coach [Brian] O'Connor thought I had another year till about three weeks ago," Hagan said. "It made a difference, too, for the [June 5] draft, as to whether I was classified as a senior or a redshirt junior."

Hagan, who required surgery after a 2003 shoulder injury, played in 15 of 54 games that season. NCAA rules allow for a redshirt year if an applicant has participated in no more than 20 percent of a team's games; that figure for Hagan was 27.7 percent.

Had the Cavaliers played as many games as they have this year and reached the NCAA tournament, Hagan might have gotten the extra year "but, to tell you the truth," he said. "I wasn't extremely set on coming back."

Hagan, 22, recently earned a degree in systems engineering, posting a 3.5 grade-point average in his major and a 3.25 GPA overall.

"It would have been nice to have the option of coming back," Hagan said, "but, it looks like the draft is going to work out. I talked to a few scouts [Wednesday] and they said they wanted me as part of their organization.

"Maybe they were just making small talk. But, in the grand scheme of things, I think I'll get picked up."

Hagan came into this season with exactly a .300 batting average for his college career, but he had never played a whole year. He missed 16 games in 2004 because of a knee operation, and he played in only 37 of 61 games in 2005 because of a broken thumb.

For his first two years in college, Hagan also served as punter for the Cavaliers' football team, which meant he was unavailable for fall baseball, where skills are honed and positions won.

Although he originally came to UVa on a football scholarship, Hagan gave that up in the spring of 2004 and directed his full athletic attention to baseball.

"A lot of people have asked if I regret the decision and I haven't," he said. "Not one time. I think I made the right decision at the right time. The baseball program here has taken off.

"Not a lot of people are fortunate enough to play two sports in college, and I was appreciative of that. But, I was recruited earlier for baseball than football and that was what I wanted to do."

Hagan has taken the time originally devoted to football and used it to get better in baseball. He worked on his sprints last summer and this year has stolen 19 bases in 21 attempts.

"I'm not near the fastest guy on the team," said Hagan, who was named Timesland athlete of the year in 2002, when he used the break between football and baseball to start at forward on Cave Spring's Group AAA championship basketball team.

Hagan has 14 extra-base hits, but he is still looking for his first home run of the season after hitting one in each of his first three seasons, including an opposite-field poke in the 2004 ACC Tournament in Salem.

Hagan has never homered at UVa's spacious Davenport Field, and that's been the topic of ribbing from teammates who are accustomed to seeing him homer with some regularity in batting practice.

Hagan thinks that scouts realize how difficult it is to homer at Virginia, where the Cavaliers have nine in 34 games, "but it hasn't really come up in draft talk," he said. "Look at Ryan Zimmerman. Power comes with time."

Zimmerman, the fourth overall selection in last year's draft, had seven home runs in 174 career games at Virginia. He has nine already this season for the Washington Nationals.

Zimmerman and pitcher Matt Avery both forfeited their final seasons of college eligibility, but the Cavaliers improved on last year's 41-20 record and broke the school record for victories.

UVa was eliminated from the ACC tournament when Florida State defeated the Cavaliers 11-0 in a game that was limited to seven innings by the "slaughter rule" -- hardly the way a team would want to go into the ACC Tournament.

"You could say that," Hagan said, "but last year, we got to the [ACC] championship game and two days later we had to fly to Oregon. We were worn out, we played two games and we were on our way back home.

"Looking at where we are right now, yes, we went 1-2 [in the ACC Tournament], but we're home, we're rested, we're going to be ready to play. If we could get past the regional, we'd be the first UVa team to do so."

Chances are, Hagan would be in the middle of it.