Western Carolina head coach Bobby Moranda knows his team cannot sneak up on Clemson when the two meet up on Friday night in Game 2 of the Clemson Regional. The Catamounts and the Tigers have met 77 times on the baseball diamond though the years, and every year since 1978.
“There are no surprises between Clemson and Western Carolina, they have been playing forever,” Moranda said following his team’s practice on Thursday at Doug Kingsmore Stadium. “That tradition of coming up to Cullowhee started with Jack Leggett and Bill Wilhelm and Monte (Lee) came up this year and then we came down here.
“It is close. We know each other very well and we have great respect for their program and I feel they do of ours. We will definitely get their A-plus game for sure. There is no question about it.”
The Tigers, who head into the NCAA Regional with a nine-game winning streak, held on in both regular season meetings to beat Western. In fact, the Catamounts had a 6-3 lead on Clemson in the April 12th meeting at Doug Kingsmore, but Seth Beer smashed a two-run homer in the bottom of the eighth inning and Eli White tied it up a little later with a two-out double to force extra innings.
In the 10th, Weston Wilson singled in the game-winning run as the Tigers rallied for a 7-6 victory. Clemson also beat the Catamounts, 10-8, in Cullowhee, North Carolina on March 30.
Playing the Tigers close in each game, plus the familiarity they have with Tiger Field, has Western Carolina feeling confident about Friday night’s game.
“We feel pretty confident. We play these guys a lot,” said first baseman Matt Smith. “We know how good they are. I feel like they respect us a lot. I feel like it is going to be a dog fight for sure.
“We know what we can do. We came together as a team. Coming through the (SoCon) tournament like we did, we have some confidence going. We are doing pretty well right now.”
The Catamounts (30-29) went 5-1 in the SoCon Tournament last week and beat regular season champion Mercer twice in the championship round to earn the automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament, including a 3-2 victory in the championship game.
Before the tournament, they were 7-16 in their previous 23 games.
“We were playing for our lives and we had a ton of confidence,” outfielder Kramer Ferrell said. “It gives us the confidence to roll into here … I think we are playing really good baseball offensively and in the two championship games our pitching stepped up even when we really weren’t scoring that much. They took care of us and we took care of them when we needed to. I think it helps.”
Clemson (42-18) is playing with a lot of confidence, too. As mentioned, the Tigers have won nine straight, including a perfect 4-0 run in the ACC Tournament, which included wins over Virginia, Louisville, Wake Forest and Florida State. They have also won 15 of their last 18.
“On any given day we believe we can beat anybody, but they are going to bring their best guys and we are going to bring our best guys. We are here to compete,” Farrell said. “They are really good baseball team. They have some really good dudes over there. They are a baseball team just like us and we are going to come here and compete tomorrow.”
—Photo courtesy Catamount Sports.com