Baseball: Panthers seek revenge against Mountaineers

Although it might not sport the intensity of the Backyard Brawls of days past, the Pittsburgh Panthers baseball team’s nonconference matchup against the West Virginia Mountaineers Tuesday evening is nonetheless a key contest for the surging Panthers squad.

Pitt, coming off a three-game sweep against No. 23 Georgia Tech last weekend, has won seven of its past eight games and looked much more comfortable after a sub-.500 start to the Panthers’ first season as members of the ACC.

Outfielder Boo Vazquez thinks that the recent string of success has a lot to do with everything falling into place at the right time.

“I just think we’ve been putting everything together,” said Vazquez. “We’re hitting and pitching well at the same time, while before we were doing one or the other, but not both.”

Pitt head coach Joe Jordano said he has also been pleased with the team’s play of late, and he would like to see the team continue on as they have begun, even if he thinks there is still some room for improvement.

“We have been executing very well,” he said. “We are minimizing mistakes and playing solid baseball. I’m not sure if we’ve gelled yet as a team, but we are doing things that are putting us in a position to win games.”

Despite the recent string of success, the Panthers need to be at their best Tuesday night, because Pitt’s only loss in its last eight games came at the hands of West Virginia, who defeated the Panthers 6-3 on March 25.

According to Vazquez, who leads the team with five home runs and 32 runs batted in, the Panthers are still looking for some vengeance, despite trying to send that loss out of sight and out of mind.

“I think we did a good job of putting that loss behind us before the Georgia Tech series,” said Vazquez, a junior out of Youngstown, Ohio. “But now, we remember the sting we felt losing to them. It’s definitely some added motivation.”

That loss, in which the Panthers fell to West Virginia by a score of 6-3, featured freshman right-hander T.J. Zeuch as the starting pitcher. Despite suffering the loss that game, during which he surrendered three hits and two earned runs in four innings pitched, Zeuch doesn’t feel a need for a shift in approach.

“I’m really just looking to do the same thing I did,” Zeuch said. “Maybe a few more fastballs earlier, but overall, more of the same.”

Despite going in with the same mindset, Zeuch understands the importance of the contest.

“This game is huge for us,” said the righty, currently 1-2 with a 1.98 ERA on the season. “Not only in order to keep the momentum going, but also because a win over West Virginia is always a strong win.”

But Jordano was quick to downplay the intensity of the rivalry game.

“It is always a competitive game with the Mountaineers,” Jordano, currently in his 17th year as the Panthers’ manager, said. “Coaches on both sides respect each other and will compete hard, but at the end of the day, it’s just another opportunity to play ball. I don’t believe we ever had the same sense of rivalry with [West Virginia] as in basketball or football.”

The game against the Mountaineers is just a one-game matchup, and the contest begins at 6 p.m. Tuesday evening at Charles L. Cost Field. As previously mentioned, Zeuch will be on the mound for the Panthers, whereas the Mountaineers’ starting pitcher is yet to be announced. The matchup is a precursor for Pitt to the huge upcoming weekend series against the No. 1 Virginia Cavaliers.