Davis stifles Deacons

After the fact, Virginia coach Brian O’Connor was questioned at length about pulling Neal Davis early during his relief appearance Tuesday against Coastal Carolina.
The southpaw fanned three of the five batters he faced in a tie game against a ranked opponent.
Davis helped answer the question Friday — and he also helped Virginia remain perfect at Davenport Field in the ACC.
Behind three scoreless innings of relief work from Davis, the Cavaliers mounted a rally and upended Wake Forest, 4-2, in the opening game of the weekend series.
“I thought the story of the game was Neal Davis,” O’Connor said. “He really took command of the game when his number was called.
“I knew that we would be without Matt Packer out of the bullpen and I envisioned a scenario where I would need Neal for an extended outing tonight. Fortunately, he did the job.”
Virginia, which blanked Wake Forest after the opening frame, improved to 30-10 overall and 12-7 in the ACC. The Demon Deacons fell to 14-23 overall and 6-12 in the league.
Long before Davis entered the contest, Wake Forest took a quick lead on a monstrous two-run homer to left from Willy Fox.
The blast, Fox’s fourth homer of the season, came in the first inning against UVa starting pitcher Pat McAnaney, who was making his debut in a new spot at the front of the weekend rotation.
McAnaney, who worked five innings on just six days of rest, said he had struggled against Fox in a meeting during summer baseball in 2006.
“I thought I got the pitch in against him and it just stayed up,” McAnaney said. “I just left it up. And it looked like the ball was carrying pretty well early in the game.”
It did not help, McAnaney admitted, that his slider was not running through the strike zone until the third or fourth inning.
While McAnaney stymied Wake over his final four innings, the Cavaliers slowly solved Wake starter Garrett Bullock.
Virginia shortstop Greg Miclat opened the third inning with a single, stole second and was sacrificed to third on a deep fly from Tyler Cannon. David Adams followed with another fly ball, plating Miclat to cut the two-run deficit in half.
After McAnaney, who threw 106 pitches, allowed a leadoff single in the sixth to Wake catcher Mike Murray, O’Connor quickly turned to Davis.
“I can’t argue with that decision,” McAnaney said. “Neal has pitched great all season and my pitch count was up at that point after I struggled early in the game.”
Davis, who entered with an 0.65 ERA, promptly retired the Demon Deacons in order.
“I was little surprised that they came to me,” Davis said, “because we usually go lefty-righty-lefty out of the bullpen.”
Moments after Davis’ first inning, Virginia chased Bullock from the contest.
The game-changing drama started with one out in the sixth after rightfielder Dan Grovatt walked and designated hitter Tyler Biddix hit an infield chopper that bounced into the grass in left.
Virginia catcher Franco Valdes advanced the runners with a sacrifice bunt, setting the stage for freshmen leftfielder John Barr to deliver what O’Connor called the “biggest hit of his young career.”
Barr, who was making his 15th career start, pushed a curveball into left field to give Virginia a 3-2 lead.
“He threw me in with some fastballs early in the at-bat and then came back with a curve,” Barr said. “I knew they were playing deep and all I was thinking was ‘get down.’”
In the eighth, Davis made things interesting by sandwiching a pair of walks to left-handed batters around an infield fly. After the second walk, however, Davis waved Valdes to remain behind the plate, hoping it would signal to the coaching staff that he wanted to remain in the contest.
He did.
Luckily for Davis, Grovatt was able to make an awkward catch in right on a tailing fly ball, and the southpaw ended the frame by getting Wake’s Tyler Smith to ground out to second.
“I lost it a little bit against the lefties, but I wanted to finish my inning and take care of what I started,” Davis said. “I didn’t want to put our closer, Michael Schwimer, in a bad situation.”
Virginia added an insurance run in the eighth after Barr walked, advanced to second on a sacrifice and scored on an opposite-field single to right field by Miclat.
Schwimer retired the Demon Deacons in order in the ninth to register his 11th save.
Davis, who fanned two, improved to 3-0 on the season. Bullock (3-4) worked 5.2 innings, allowing seven hits, four walks and three earned runs.
The two teams are scheduled to play tonight at 6 p.m.