ECU 2
GREENVILLE - East Carolina's Warren Gaspar drew a bases-loaded walk from Michael Gross in the bottom of the ninth to give No. 20 ECU a 2-1 win against No. 21 North Carolina on Wednesday in front of 3,890, the largest crowd in Harrington Field history.
Four East Carolina pitchers allowed UNC (25-14) just four hits and a season-low one run in taking just its second win in the last 10 tries against the Tar Heels.
Neal Sears (5-0) pitched a perfect ninth inning for the win, while Gross falls to 3-3 with the loss.
"We knew this would be a tough game and that East Carolina had some good pitchers," said UNC coach Mike Fox.
"We just didn't do enough offensively to win the game. That's no discredit to East Carolina; I was just surprised that we played sluggishly tonight. We didn't have many good swings of the bat, and when we did they made plays on them."
With the game tied 1-1 going into the bottom of the ninth, Ben Sanderson and Darryl Lawhorn had back-to-back one-out singles. Bryant Ward grounded out, but Gross issued consecutive walks to end the game. Gaspar worked the count full and fouled a ball to the left side that was nearly caught by Tar Heel third baseman Chris Maples. But the next pitch was low and drove in Sanderson from third for the winning run.
ECU (27-9-1) got its only other run in the third and UNC tied the game, 1-1, with an unearned run in the seventh.
Gaspar made several outstanding plays in center. He robbed Adam Greenberg of a hit with an over-the-shoulder grab at the fence to end the third inning and collected all three putouts in the fourth, including a diving catch of a Russ Adams drive to left center and a grab at the fence of a potential Chris Maples homer.
