Virginia Preparing for Balanced OU Attack

Originally Published: Jun 9, 2010 9:21 PM CDT

Corey DeMoss
Oklahoma Sports Staff Writer

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Virginia – As the Oklahoma baseball team prepares to hit the road for its Super Regional matchup against Virginia, the Cavaliers are trying to move past a close call to take down the Sooners.

Virginia, which holds the No. 1 rank in the nation, nearly sustained a monumental upset in its regional matchup with St. John’s. The Cavaliers split the first two games of the series and had to withstand a late surge to win 5-3 in the finale to move on to face OU.

The UVA players and coaches are well aware that they cannot dwell on their near miss, but must now shift all of their focus to a difficult matchup with the Sooners.

“We face a tough opponent in Oklahoma,” said head coach Brian O’Connor. “Last year, they were a top-eight national seed. This year they’re having a great year; they’ve been ranked as high as fourth in the country at points this year.”

One of the biggest challenges the Sooners offer is their balance. They feature strong starting pitching, as well as both speed and power at the plate.

“They’re a very well-balanced team,” O’Connor said. “They’ve got really good pitching, great defense, and a lineup to where they have close to 100 home runs and 100 stolen bases. It’s hard to find that in college baseball. So it’s going to be a tough weekend for us.”

Many of the Virginia players admitted that they are not particularly familiar with the Sooners, but are impressed by the stats OU has put this year and by the way the Sooners took care of North Carolina in the Norman regional.

“I know they’re good,” said right fielder Dan Grovatt. “They won their regional; they were hosting a regional, so obviously they’ve had a good year all year. They beat UNC, which is a very good program. We’re going to have to play our best ball to beat them.”

The Cavaliers have been carried by strong offense all year, scoring double-digit runs in 22 different games this season. But they are also well aware that such explosive scoring is unlikely against OU, which has given up double-digit runs only three times.

“When you get to this time of the year, you’re not just going to go out there and slug out 12 runs against a pitching staff like we’re going to face this week,” O’Connor said. “It comes down to execution, taking advantage of your opportunities, and trying to hold them down.”

While beating Oklahoma is the team’s focus this week, the Cavaliers’ main goal is much bigger than that.

“Our goal is definitely to win the College World Series,” said center fielder Jarrett Parker. “It’s a real big stepping stone for us, but we still have bigger goals in mind.”