Cavaliers Now

Virginia Baseball: Bats Wake Up, Hoos Claim First ACC Series Win at Cal

Matt Newton

Virginia Athletics

Virginia's offense, expected to be one of the best in all of college baseball, has fallen well short of that mark so far this season and was one of the main culrpits behind the Cavaliers' slow start to the 2025 campaign. UVA arrived in California coming off of an important, but not impressive walk-off win against Maryland on a neutral site and still desperately needed to show signs of improvement in order to get this season pointed in the right direction.

Friday's game 1, the first-ever regular season game between Virginia and Cal, did absolutely nothing to quell those concerns regarding UVA's offense. The Cavaliers were held to one run on four hits, stranded 10 runners on base, and batted 1 for 6 with runners in scoring position and 1 for 13 with runners on base. Jay Woolfolk and the UVA pitching staff delivered a decent, but not great performance, and the Hoos dropped game 1 by a score of 6-1.

Game 2 looked to be headed towards a similarly disappointing outcome as a two-run home run from Henry Ford in the top of the fourth stood as Virginia's only scoring in the first eight frames. Cal took a 7-2 lead into the ninth inning and appeared to be well on its way to earning a major ACC series victory.

Virginia's bats woke up from their hibernation just in the nick of time.

Freshman Chone James got the rally started with a leadoff single and Walker Buchanan and Luke Hanson followed that up with two-strike singles to load the bases with no outs. Aidan Teel was hit by a pitch and then Aiden Harris drew a walk, scoring two runs for Virginia to make it 7-4. Trey Wells struck out for the first out of the inning, but then Eric Becker hit an infield single to bring home Hanson. Ford grounded out to score Teel, cutting the deficit to one run at 7-6, but putting the Cavaliers down to their final out.

James Nunnallee was hit by a pitch and then the man who started the rally, Chone James, came up to bat again and delivered a clutch two-run double into the gap in right center field, scoring Harris and Becker to put Virginia in front. Walker Buchanan followed that up with a double of his own to the same gap in right center, bringing home Nunnallee and James to give the Hoos a 10-7 lead.

Cal got one back in the ninth, but Matt Lanzendorfer managed to hang on to complete the save and secure Virginia's thrilling 10-8 comeback victory.

Perhaps inspired by their own rally from the previous day, the Cavaliers carried that momentum into Sunday's rubber match and the bats came through with another big inning. But this time, they didn't wait until the late stages of the game.

After Cal got on the board with a run in the first, Virginia answered with a nine-run top of the second, which started with an opposite-field solo home run from Henry Ford.

Chone James continued his big weekend with an RBI single, then Aidan Teel scored Jacob Ference with a double down the right field line, and then James and Eric Becker came home on a wild pitch and fielding error, respectively. The next two UVA batters reached base to load them up with no outs and then Henry Godbout fouled off five-straight pitches before getting all of the next one and blasting it to left-center field for his first home run of the season, a grand slam that made it 9-1.

Virginia scored just two runs the rest of the game, a solo home run by Walker Buchanan in the top of the third and an RBI groundout by Nunnallee in the seventh, but that was plenty as the Golden Bears could only muster two runs in the fourth and two runs in the seventh against Evan Blanco and the UVA pitching staff. Blanco made his first weekend start of the season and earned the win after giving up two earned runs on six hits and striking out four batters in five innings of work. Jack O'Connor pitched the final 2.1 innings scoreless to close out UVA's 11-5 victory to clinch the series.

In their first eight games against major conference opponents, the Cavaliers had scored double-digit runs only once. Then, they did it back-to-back games, both times using a single massive inning to win those games and the series. Will this be the turning point for Virginia's offense to get on track moving forward? We will soon find out.

Now 12-6 overall and 3-3 in ACC play, Virginia returns to Charlottesville for its next four games and eight of its next nine games. The Cavaliers will host Richmond on Wednesday at 4pm ET at Disharoon Park (ACC Network Extra) before welcoming Duke to Charlottesville for a three-game series beginning on Friday evening.

More Virginia Baseball News

Virginia Baseball Walks Off Maryland 7-6 in Fredericksburg

Virginia Baseball Falls to Boston College 6-3, Drops First ACC Series

UVA Baseball Wins 'Batting Practice', Beats Boston College 22-16

Virginia Baseball Blows Lead, Drops ACC Opener to Boston College 7-4

UVA Baseball Scores 15 Runs in Two Innings, Run-Rules William & Mary 15-4

Published
Matt Newton
MATT NEWTON

Matt launched Virginia Cavaliers On SI in August of 2021 and has since served as the site's publisher and managing editor, covering all 23 NCAA Division I sports teams at the University of Virginia. He is from Downingtown, Pennsylvania and graduated from UVA in May of 2021.