After waiting nearly 20 hours to resume its first game of the NCAA Greenville Regional with no outs in the bottom of the ninth inning, the NC State baseball team took just 12 minutes to go down scoreless.
Play was suspended in the middle of the ninth inning at 3:58 Friday night, and after nearly six hours of delay, the game was officially postponed until noon on Saturday. Both teams stuck around for nearly the entire six-hour delay, waiting in the dugouts and locker rooms while killing time.
“Can’t control the weather,” head coach Elliott Avent said bluntly when asked about the delay.
Once play resumed on Saturday, junior designated hitter Brad Debo gave Wolfpack fans hope with a hard-hit line drive into right field, but the ball ultimately fell into the right fielder’s waiting glove.
Sophomore outfielder Terrell Tatum, who had pinch hit for sophomore outfielder Devonte Brown in the bottom of the seventh inning, quickly went down 0-2 in the count but battled back to draw a walk and give NC State life.
After junior outfielder Lawson McArthur, who had also pinch hit in the seventh for sophomore infielder J.T. Jarrett, worked a 3-1 count to open the at-bat, Tatum took off for second base and slid in safely, putting a runner in scoring position with one out.
Facing a sidearm pitcher with an unorthodox delivery in Campbell right-hander Landry Moore, McArthur fanned on a 3-2 curveball in the dirt, forcing the Pack down to its last out.
Pinch-hitting for junior infielder Dillon Cooper, freshman infielder Vojtech Mensik stepped to the plate with a chance to become a hero in his first NCAA Regional at-bat.
Mensik worked his way to a full count, and after fouling off a 3-2 fastball to stay alive, ripped a hard ground ball to third base, where Campbell third baseman Collin Wolf cleanly gloved the ball and threw it to first for the out, sealing the upset and sending NC State into the losers’ bracket.
“We were all so confident we were going to pull that out,” sophomore outfielder Jonny Butler said. “But it didn’t work out that way.”
Dropping its first game puts the Wolfpack at a serious disadvantage, as it will have to win four games in a row to escape from Greenville and advance to the super regionals, but Avent is confident in his squad.
“If they’re hungry and they want to fight,” Avent said. “There is no [team] more equipped to come through the losers’ bracket than us.”
NC State loses the first game of a regional for the second consecutive season and will take on the loser of ECU and Quinnipiac on Sunday at noon. If the Pack is able to win, it will play again on Sunday at 8 p.m.
Sophomore catcher Patrick Bailey swings and misses against Campbell on Friday, May 31 at Clark-LeClair Stadium in Greenville. Bailey went 0-3 with one run batted in and two strikeouts as the Wolfpack lost 5-4.
