Mikio Aoki was named the new head coach of the Boston College Eagles today as Peter Hughes is movign on to Virginia Tech. Aoki was the head coach at Columbia before coming to Chestnut Hill as an Associate Head Coach. He had a 87-140 record at Columbia which was a solid improvement from before he started.
UNC heads to Alabama for a SEC-ACC matchup. UNC is a better team then Alabama with solid hitting and 2 first round picks in there pitching staff with Andrew Miller and Daniel Bard. UNC should sweep them in the series
South Carolina visits Georgia for the Super Regional. Georgia has a ton of good arms and a good pitchign staff as they should take this series.
Stanford at Oregon State should be a win for the beavers
Missouri at Cal St Fullerton is a very easy pick if you look at it on paper but Cal State will be taken to 3 games but win the series though.
Oklahoma at Rice will have the Owls come out on top.
Miami at Ole Miss is a win for the Hurricanes.
College of Charleston visits the Yellow Jackets of Ga Tech in a Great Super Regional matchup this weekend. College of Charleston face a stiff Challenge from the hitting Jackets. Ga Tech is led by Super-Sophomore Matt Wieters who is from the Charleston SC area. Wieters has been hitting better since he got his contacts redone recently as evidenced in this article. Since May 1st, He is hitting .431 with 7 homeruns and 22 RBI's.
Charleston will send Nick Chigges to the mound in the opener on Friday on ESPN at Noon. Nick is 11-1 in 15 starts with a 1.32 ERA. He has struck out 94 guys in that time period. The biggest stat for him is that opponents are hitting .204 off of him. Josh McLaughlin is the closer for the Cougars and he has a 1.27 ERA with 15 saves. He has 71 strikeouts in 56.2 innings.
Georgia Tech also is led by Blake Wood who is their ace pitcher. He has a 5.01 ERA and is 10-4. David Duncan is a lanky left-handed pitcher with mediocre stuff but has a 7-2 record by a 5.50 ERA. The GA Tech rotation for the weekend is not complete as of this article so I can't tell you when they are going to pitch. Ga Tech needs to win this series with their bats and that is led besides Wieters by Jeff Kindel and Wes Hodges. Kindel is a solid outfielder with a good bat with some pop which I witnessed when GA Tech took on the Boston College Eagles in Chestnut Hill this season. Hodges is battling a stress fracture in his leg but still is hitting .337 with 11 HR's.
I predict an upset in this series with College of Charleston in 3 games. I just don't think Tech's batting will be able to beat this staff.
Clemson is hosting upstart Oral Roberts in the Super Regionals this weekend. Clemson came through the regionals with an undefeated weekend with victories over UNC-Asheville, Elon, and Mississippi State. Oral Roberts also went undefeated by going to Fayetteville Arkansas and knocking off Oklahoma twice and Arkansas once.
The Clemson Tigers are led by 10 MLB draft picks which include Tyler Colvin and Andy D'Alessio. There is a good article in The Post and Courier on Tyler Colvin this week which can be found here. Each of Clemson's weekend starters were drafted on Day 1 with Jason Berken going the highest in the sixth round. Clemson according to coach Jack Leggett says this team has a thick skin in this article from WLTX in South Carolina.
Oral Roberts is one of the hottest teams in the country heading into this series. They have won 31 out of their last 34 games to reach the Super-Regionals for the first time ever. They are led by junior catcher Andy Bouchie who batted .377 with 12 HR's and 53 RBI's. The Tulsa-based squad's pitching has become healthy which has also led to the great 31-3 record in the last 34 games. Chris Ashman heads to this Super-Regional 10-1 with a 2.02 ERA in 93.1 innings pitched.
I predict a 2 game sweep by the number 1 seeded Tigers.
The Regionals are over and now we can focus on the 16 teams fighting for the 8 spots in Omaha.
Friday through Sunday Super-Regionals
Oral Roberts at Clemson
College of Charleston at Georgia Tech
Missouri at Cal St. Fullerton
North Carolina at Alabama
Saturday through Monday Super-Regionals
Oklahoma at Rice
South Carolina at Georgia
Miami of Florida at Ole Miss
Stanford at Oregon State
A Full preview will be coming for each series in the coming days. So please come back.
According to an Article in a some newspapers, Peter Hughes will be named the next head coach of the Virginia Tech program next week. This is a major concern for Boston College baseball as they had a very good head coach who was starting to develop good ballplayers. The main problem here is that VA Tech is not a much better situation then BC. I think the administration at Boston College better look at themselves in the mirror and look at the status of the BC Baseball program. Where is the plans for this new ballpark that is in the works? Is the team fully-funded yet? Boston College needs to make a commitment to the program or the next head coach will leave too. Click here for the article.
reddit
del.icio.us
