It took only two innings of Saturday’s game against Duke for the Terrapins baseball team to assert control at Bob “Turtle” Smith Stadium. The Terps sent 15 batters to the plate, chased Duke starter Trent Swart and staked a 7-0 lead six outs into the ballgame.
It took only the third inning for those first two frames to look like an aberration. Blue Devils reliever Drew Van Orden retired the lower third of the Terps’ lineup in order in the third, the Terps’ bats settled down and Duke was still barely within striking distance.
That didn’t last long. Instead of lining the scoreboard in left field with zeros, the Terps kept attacking Duke’s pitching, posting crooked numbers the rest of the way. They added at least one run in each of the remaining innings – including seven in the eighth – as they pummeled the Blue Devils, 21-2.
It was an intimidating look at what the Terps (24-14) are capable of when hitting on all cylinders in the middle of their season, which continues tonight at home against James Madison – a team with an ERA of 6.79.
Asked whether he had ever played for a team that scored as many runs in a game, first baseman Tomo Delp answered: “I don’t think that many. That was pretty sudden and pretty crazy to see.”
In all, 12 Terps recorded at least one hit, eight had multiple RBI, seven had multi-hit games and six scored multiple runs. All season long, the Terps have echoed the adage “hitting is contagious,” and that mantra bore out against the Blue Devils as they scored their most runs in a conference game in 13 years and set a season high in hits with 21.
It all started at the top with second baseman Kyle Convissar, who led the team with a 4-for-5 line and reached base in six of his seven plate appearances. The sophomore led off an inning three times and was 2-for-2 with a walk in those plate appearances, scoring each time.
“I used to hit No. 1 in high school, so I’m sort of used to it a little bit,” Convissar said. “Hitting No. 1 is sort of a challenge, but after the first inning, it’s kind of the same thing. I kind of like it. You get to start off the game right away and hopefully help the team right away.”
Overall, Convissar scored five times – the most runs a Terp has scored in almost seven years – and had a home run, double, two singles and two RBI. In Saturday’s game alone, he bumped his batting average from .258 to .279.
“I saw a lot of fastballs, but I felt pretty comfortable yesterday,” Convissar said. “Everyone was hitting around me and it made me feel pretty good. The team effort yesterday was pretty outstanding, so it was a pretty positive day.”
Up and down the starting lineup, the Terps got contributions in their largest victory this year. The biggest boon of all may have come from the bench, from which five players entered the game and combined to go 8-for-11 with seven RBI and five runs.
Reserve first baseman Jake Stinnett, most notably, was 2-for-2 with two RBI and two runs scored on Saturday before adding another double and go-ahead RBI on Sunday. Coach Erik Bakich had been trying to work Stinnett, a relief pitcher who has seen time at the corner infield and outfield spots this year, into the lineup throughout the year.
“That was big, to have him be able to do that for us,” Bakich said. “He’s taking advantage of the opportunities he gets, and he’ll get more.”
After last Wednesday’s 3-0 win over West Virginia and Sunday’s 5-3 loss to Duke, Bakich stressed the importance of quality at-bats, a subjective statistic calculated by the coaching staff. He said the Terps had 38 quality at-bats Saturday, a gaudy total that explained the impetus for their offensive explosion.
With James Madison (11-24-1) bringing along more suspect pitching to Bob “Turtle” Smith Stadium for tonight’s matchup, the Terps should have the opportunity to rebound from Sunday’s 5-3 loss and maybe recreate some of the offense from Saturday.
“We just executed our plan much more efficiently,” Bakich said of Saturday’s game. “We strung a lot of quality at-bats together, which resulted in scoring multiple runs in multiple innings. We did a good job of being very aggressive. We had the pitches we could handle.”
dgallen@umdbk.com
