Plus all the things VT One said.

Seriously. Many holes to fill early in the year. It took patience and it looks to have paid off.

Ways to lose. Losing 13-4 to Marshall was ridiculous. The SEC stretch in Arlington may have hurt them confidence wise a bit much early…but seems to have shown where our weaknesses & strengths lay. The conference schedule has also eased a bit as we started with 6 road games vs GT & UVA. The signs that we could be competitive were there by avoiding sweeps then. Pitt, NCSU & Cal aren’t great but Pitt has shown they are scrappy and tough after bouncing back to whip UVA after losing to us. Taking road games at GT, Miami, UVa, BC all helped despite losing those series…the confidence began to be restored And of course Henry Cook heated up with the weather. He’s a good player so valuable defensively but when his bat gets going it’s enormous

Szefc protected Stieg early in the season and Renfrow to a lesser extent. Eisenreich started early, had down time, then came back as a reliever until recently reclaiming the third starter role. Renfrow and Stieg are flourishing, at their best the past few weeks. Eisenreich was really good today. Freshman Ethan Grim was forced into seven weekend starts and struggled. He was very good in relief today. Crowl regained some of his past form and Swift emerged as a lock down closer. Several guys have pitched well situationally, too. Ethan Ball has matured and is on a tear. Cook came out of a monumental slump and has been very hot. Szefc has settled on our best hitting line up and things are good. And the most important point of all is that we played a brutal early schedule early that still has us with a good RPI. The late season schedule is a much more manageable slate. Lastly, winning, just like losing, is contagious.