Virginia edges UNC baseball in 11 innings

Skye Bolt said he hit the ball with everything he had. He thought the game was over.

Michael Massardo apparently thought so, too. The pinch runner didn’t wait to tag first base. He kept running full speed around the bases as the ball jetted toward left field.

It was a mistake.

The would-be, walkoff three-run home run fell short, caught at the top of the left-field wall in front of the Boshamer Stadium scoreboard. One North Carolina run would score as Landon Lassiter tagged from third, but Massardo — the tying run — strayed too far from first. He was already on the other side of the diamond when the ball came back to first for the final out of Saturday’s game.

The No. 2 Tar Heels (47-8, 21-7 ACC) lost 8-7 to No. 7 Virginia (45-9, 22-8), dropping the rubber match of the series on UNC’s senior day. The final play was an unusual ending to a highly competitive 11-inning battle between two ACC heavyweights — an ending that even UNC coach Mike Fox had never seen before.

“Out of the 1,900 (games) I’ve seen, probably not,” Fox said.

But no one pinned the loss on the freshman Massardo after the game.

“I think he, along with the rest of crowd, thought it was gone,” Bolt said. “If it’s off the top of the wall, he scores and ties up the ball game. That’s what he was thinking. I’d put myself in his position — I’m doing the same thing. He’s not to blame on that play.”

Though the play marked the end of the game, most of the damage came half an inning earlier in the top of the 11th, when the Cavaliers built a four-run 8-4 lead with some help by the Tar Heel defense.

The Cavaliers scored their first run of the inning as Colin Moran muffed a throw to third on a sacrifice bunt. The damage mounted from there with a two-run triple from shortstop John LaPrise and a RBI single from first baseman Jared King.

“I hate that we really lost the game because we didn’t make a defensive play,” Fox said. “The game could’ve been different if we weren’t down four. That’s the toughest part … You’d rather not lose a game like that.”

The loss came a day after UNC clinched its first ACC regular season championship since 1990 with a six-run rally and comeback victory. Saturday’s game didn’t impact the standings, but with 4,100 fans in attendance and with two of the nation’s best teams facing off, Fox said it had a championship-like feel.

UNC starter Hobbs Johnson and Virginia’s Whit Mayberry were locked in a pitcher’s duel for much of the afternoon. Mayberry held UNC to one run through five innings, while Johnson retired 19 batters in a row through one stretch.

But after falling behind 4-1 in a three-run Virginia eighth, the Tar Heels were forced to play catch-up for the second game in a row. Again, they rose to the challenge as they rallied for two runs in the bottom half of the eighth, and a Moran RBI single tied it up in the ninth. And the Tar Heels nearly completed another rally in the 11th before Bolt’s deep drive was caught and Massardo was doubled up on the basepaths.

But even though that last rally fell short, Fox said he was pleased with his team’s effort nonetheless. The ACC tournament, in which UNC will be a No. 1 seed, begins Wednesday, and the NCAA regionals will follow shortly after that. Saturday’s game against Virginia, much like the first two games of the series, was a precursor to those upcoming playoff matches, and he said both teams showed a strong desire to compete.

“The Virginia coaches said you should make everybody pay again going out,” Fox said. “I thought that was a classic line.

“That was worth the admission of two games. A terrific game. Wow.”