Before Saturday’s game against No. 2 Virginia, the Terrapin baseball team honored the program’s past conference champions, offering a rare glimpse at the success coach Erik Bakich hopes to one day bring back to Shipley Field.

Once the game started, the Terps showed just how much work remains before they can think about etching their own piece of program history in the record books.

Against a Cavaliers squad widely considered one of the deepest teams in the country, the Terps never stood a chance. Virginia used strong starting pitching and a balanced offensive attack to dominate the Terps on its way to a series sweep, outscoring them by a combined 43-7.

“I told the guys after the game, there is no doubt Virginia is a better ball club right now,” Bakich said. “We were just overmatched.”

That point was no more apparent than in the teams’ Friday nightcap, a 27-4 shellacking. The Terps’ only lead came when shortstop Alfredo Rodriguez hit a solo home run to lead off the bottom of the first inning.

The lead was short-lived. Virginia scored four runs in the top half of the second and cruised from there, amassing 28 hits in the Terps’ most lopsided defeat of the season.

The Cavaliers routinely exposed a thin Terps pitching staff that was further stretched after weekend weather forecasts forced Bakich to scrap the Sunday finale in favor of a Friday doubleheader.

“That loss was by far the biggest blemish of the weekend,” Bakich said. “We just don’t have the depth right now to compete in doubleheaders. We got in a pitching bind early, and that’s why you saw the result you did.”

In Friday’s opener, the Terps’ offense spoiled yet another solid start from ace Brett Harman by scoring just one run — a home run by left fielder Brandon Padula — in the 5-1 loss.

Facing a lineup with just one player hitting less than .300, Harman was able to keep the Terps within striking distance by limiting the Cavaliers to just eight hits and three runs over eight innings while striking out eight. It was Harman’s third straight quality start against a conference foe and his sixth in 10 starts on the season.

Unfortunately for the Terps, Virginia countered with sophomore ace Danny Hultzen, who responded with an even better performance than Harman’s. The Bethesda native was masterful, allowing just six hits and one run in 7.2 innings and offering Bakich a look at what could have been.

“Being where he is from, there is no way that kid should be playing anywhere except Maryland right now,” Bakich said. “He is one of the top starters in our league and he was great on Friday. But I think if our offense performed at the level it is capable of all season, [Harman] would be in the discussion as well.”

Despite the series sweep, which culminated in an easy 11-2 win Saturday, Bakich insisted there were positives to take from the otherwise disappointing weekend.

In another step toward building what Bakich called “a culture of winning,” the Terps honored players from the program’s 1965, 1970 and 1971 ACC Championship teams.

Even Elton “Jack” Jackson, the Terps’ coach from 1961-1990 and the program’s all-time winningest coach with 471 wins, flew in from Michigan to throw out the first pitch.

Bakich also noted Virginia’s rise from mediocrity to a perennial national power over the past decade as an example of what he hopes to accomplish in College Park in the coming years.

“Seven years ago, that team was a cellar-dweller,” Bakich said. “For all the naysayers who say Maryland can’t become a baseball school, we can just point to Virginia. Every good program has had a point in their history when they turned it around. That’s what we are trying to do here, whether it is this year or next year.”

lemaire@umdbk.com