UNC Baseball Notebook: Resilience Highlights Regular Season Success

Attack Mode

When it comes to high-leverage, clutch situation moments, Forbes preaches that his players have to learn to love those high heartbeat moments. 

This weekend's action had those in spades, but in game one, Forbes' team did not meet the challenge.

After hammering out 36 runs against Louisville, the offense only compiled four hits, the top five of the lineup struck out 11 times, and had no answer for Duke closer Charlie Beilenson, who plowed through the UNC lineup to close out the opening win. 

"I felt like our guys were just playing," Forbes said of Thursday's performance. "I told them winning the Coastal means nothing, we are trying to beat Duke in a rivalry series. So take a deep breath and play like you've played all year." 

On Friday, the message hit home. Whether it was Cook's bunt, Parks Harber's sacrifice fly or Anthony Donofrio's hustle double in the top of the ninth, or Pence's performance in 1.1 innings of work to get the win, the Tar Heels showed up big when it mattered.  

"You're just chasing this opportunity, you're chasing RBIs," Cook said. "This should be your most fun at bats because you have a chance to put the team on top. So I would say just adapting to that mindset is probably the biggest thing."

Saturday's performance put the mindset on full display, highlighted by Cook's three-run home run - his third of the season facing an upper 90 mph arm - and Alberto Osuna's three RBI in the series decider.

"I think [Saturday] coming in we just knew that we've had an attack from the start," Osuna said. "That's exactly what we did."

Resilience 

The Coastal division title: check. ACC regular season title: check. Top seed in the ACC tournament: check. 

The Tar Heels did this with a freshman behind the dish, five new faces in the starting lineup and the loss of not one but two Friday night starting pitchers. 

Resilience and adaptability have been the name of the game. The Duke series was a culmination of the work this coaching staff and team has put in since August and a microcosm of the peaks and valleys along the way. Baseball is like that, reflecting the work put in, but highlighting that all the work done still does not guarantee success.

The woes of Thursday were reminiscent of the Tar Heels' road issues all season. Outside of the sweep at Wake Forest over Easter weekend, Carolina failed to win game one - or two - on the road. The Heels got over that hump on Friday at Duke, and finished the job Saturday.

"We lost three hardball series on the road at Miami, Virginia and NC State," Forbes said. "We've been good on the road but we haven't been great.

"We want to be tough when we're on the road because the home team is going to have the advantage. To do it here against a rival is pretty special."

Extra Inning Plus One

Before Friday's ninth inning, Casey Cook had not attempted a single bunt this year - his first in 205 at bats came with the game on the line in a pressure cooker tie game.

"I think I actually had one at the ACC tournament last year," Cook said. "I think I did the same exact thing."

It slowly rolled right to Duke standout reliever Charlie Beilenson - or as Cook joked, almost a line drive back to the pitcher, leaving him thinking he'd just failed in a big moment.

"I went from running down the first-base line thinking I screwed it up to being in a really good spot for the team," Cook said. "So it was a swing of emotions. But I mean, it worked out."

Beilenson's rush to get the lead runner - Vance Honeycutt - sailed wide, putting the Heels in business with two on and no outs, eventually leading to the winning runs.

Perhaps more incredibly, in ACC play this season prior to that game, Cook produced 21 singles and 13 home runs. And, exactly zero doubles or triples.

That all changed earlier in Friday's game as Cook drove a 2-2 pitch from Duke's David Boisvert into the right field corner, scoring Colby Wilkerson and Luke Stevenson, giving Carolina a 4-3 lead.

"I hadn't felt great in the box all series, but that's going to happen. It's baseball." Cook said Friday. "I got down two strikes and battled my butt off and (got the) line drive down the right field line ... got a good swing and good things happen."

The Week Ahead 

For the first time since 2018, UNC has captured the No. 1 seed for the ACC tournament in Charlotte. The Heels will be paired with 8th seeded Wake Forest and 12th seeded Pittsburgh. Wake and Pitt will play at 3pm on Wednesday. The Tar Heels will face Pitt at 3pm on Thursday and Wake at 7pm on Friday. All three games will be on the ACC Network.

"The regular season is done," Cook said. "We did good things and I think you can pull a little bit of confidence out of that. But at the end of the day, the postseason is a new season."