The pep talk was a little different Monday as Virginia baseball coach Brian O’Connor met with his team on the eve of the ACC Tournament.
Almost invariably, UVa has not put together a resume that would land the Cavaliers an at-large NCAA tournament berth.
Virginia received an NCAA bid in each of O’Connor’s first 14 seasons, a streak that will end if the Cavaliers (28-24) don’t win the ACC Tournament this week at Durham Bulls Athletic Park.
Tenth-seeded UVa begins play at 3 p.m. Tuesday against sixth-seeded Florida State.(39-17).
The Cavaliers are assured of only one other game, a 3 p.m. Thursday match-up with third-seeded North Carolina State (40-14).
“We’re in a situation where it’s clear that we have to go there and win the tournament to be in the NCAA tournament,” said O’Conner on a Monday morning conference call.
Virginia has won the ACC baseball tournament twice in O’Connor’s tenure. Those championships occurred in 2009 and 2011
On both occasions, UVa had the credentials to make the NCAA field regardless of tourney outcome.
This team doesn’t have a similar resume and goes into the ACC Tournament with the nation’s No. 86 RPI — ninth-best out of the ACC.
It could have been worse. UVa didn’t clinch a spot in the ACC field until Virginia Tech lost to North Carolina on Thursday night. Virginia subsequently took a weekend trip to Wake Forest, where it won the second game in a three-game set.
A lot of the pressure had been removed earlier in the week, when junior left-hander Daniel Lynch struck out 13 batters in an 8-4 victory over Georgia Tech.
Lynch (4-4, 4.08 ERA) will get the start Tuesday and senior right-hander Derek Casey (6-4, 3.58) is slated to go Thursday. Lynch has 98 strikeouts in 81 2/3 innings and Casey has 97 strikeouts in 88 innings.
If Virginia were to win its two Pool C games, it would advance to the Saturday's semifinals. The Cavaliers did not meet either Florida State or N.C. State during the regular season.
Virginia has gotten a lift in recent weeks from the return of junior outfielder Jake McCarthy, who suffered a broken wrist in the Cavaliers’ 14th game of the season and did not return until May 14.
Previously projected as a first-round draft pick, he has played in four of UVa’s past five games and gone 9-for-19 with four RBIs.
“When he’s played for us, he’s made a huge and serious impact for our ball club,” O’Connor said. “[The injury history is] unfortunate and everybody feels for Jake because he’s such a great kid.”
A 25th loss would be the high for the Cavaliers since they were 29-25 in 2003, their last season under O’Connor’s predecessor, Dennis Womack. UVa’s fewest victories during the O’Connor era was in 2016, when they were 38-22.
“I haven’t addressed it to this point,” O’Connor said Monday morning. “Today, I will address it with the team. It’s a situation we really haven’t been in before in our 14 years here.
“They’re bright kids. They know what’s going on.”