College Roundup: Seton Hall’s McCarthy Just Perfect

Strike One: McCarthy Perfect For Pirates

Sophomore righthander Shane McCarthy tossed the first perfect game in Seton Hall program history on Friday night, needing just 88 pitches to go 27 up, 27 down in a 10-0 win against Long Island-Brooklyn. It’s the second perfecto in Division I this season, following Wright State’s Jesse Scholtens.

HOW THE TOP 25 FARED

(1) Miami: won, 14-2, at Duke

(2) Mississippi State: lost, 10-3, vs. (4) Texas A&M

(3) Florida: won, 9-2, at Arkansas

(4) Texas A&M: won, 10-3, at (2) Mississippi State

(5) South Carolina: won, 3-1, at Georgia

(6) Florida State: lost, 9-0, at Wake Forest

(7) Texas Christian: won, 11-3, vs. Oklahoma

(8) Mississippi: won, 4-0, at Alabama

(9) Louisiana State: won, 7-5, at Missouri

(10) Oregon State: lost, 7-5, at Washington State

(11) Louisville: won, 15-2, vs. Clemson

(12) Vanderbilt: won, 3-0, vs. (16) Kentucky

(13) UC Santa Barbara: won, 1-0, vs. Cal State Northridge

(14) North Carolina: lost, 7-4, at Virginia

(15) Texas Tech: won, 3-1, vs. San Diego State

(16) Kentucky: lost, 3-0, at (12) Vanderbilt

(17) California: lost, 6-4, at Arizona State

(18) Long Beach State: won, 3-2 (12 inn.), vs. UC Irvine

(19) Rice: won, 9-3, vs. Western Kentucky

(20) North Carolina State: won, 8-3, at Georgia Tech

(21) Florida Atlantic: won, 6-3 (11 inn.), at Marshall

(22) Michigan: won, 10-6, vs. Nebraska

(23) South Alabama: lost, 4-3, at Appalachian State

(24) Tulane: lost, 2-1, vs. Cincinnati

(25) Southern Mississippi: lost, 5-3, at Alabama-Birmingham

McCarthy’s pitching well certainly isn’t out of nowhere. Friday’s game was already his fourth career shutout, and the Pirates’ ace led the Big East Conference in ERA as a freshman last year at 2.19 in 66 innings. The perfect game dropped his 2016 ERA down to 2.64 after nine starts. He has just 20 walks in 124 career innings as a collegian, and he was spotting both his fastball and slider on Friday, inducing 12 groundouts to go with eight strikeouts.

“My fastball command was going to the arm side and the glove side, and that really helped us mix up the counts, mix up batters, and eventually led to 27 perfect outs,” McCarthy told shupirates.com. “As much as I tried not to think about (the perfect game), it’s hard not to when nobody’s talking to you in the dugout for six, seven innings. Probably around the seven-inning mark was when I started thinking about it.”

McCarthy’s eight punchouts upped his season’s total to 57 in 58 innings, the last of them coming for final out of the game when he whiffed pinch-hitter John Knauth swinging to finish the night. The win improved the Pirates to 24-11 on the year—the most wins of any Big East team—but as they dogpiled on McCarthy after that last strikeout, there was no question whose night Friday was.

Strike Two: Aggies Hammer Bulldogs

Getting swept by Florida two weeks ago seems to have lit a fire under Texas A&M. That, or they really have it out for teams named the Bulldogs.

After demolishing Georgia’s Bulldogs by a combined 30-3 count last weekend, the fourth-ranked Aggies picked up where they left off, opening their series at Mississippi State’s Bulldogs with another double-digit scoring night in a 10-3 win on Friday. To be fair, Friday’s game was much closer than the score would indicate. MSU had the tying run 90 feet away in the bottom of the eighth before Ryan Hendrix overpowered Hunter Stovall to end the threat, preserving a 4-3 lead. The Aggies then put the game away with six runs in the top of the ninth, capped off by Nick Banks’ grand slam.

The Bulldogs scratched out a couple early runs off Brigham Hill, but the Aggies’ sophomore righthander settled in from there, working 6 2/3 innings with eight strikeouts and not allowing another run. MSU ace Dakota Hudson did have eight strikeouts over seven innings of work, but the Aggies also put up 10 hits against him. A&M took the lead for good on Hunter Melton’s two-run homer in the top of the fourth, and four different Aggie hitters finished with multi-hit games.

“I’m really proud of our guys,” A&M coach Rob Childress told 12thman.com “I thought we played hard all night long. We had a lot of heroes tonight. Brigham (Hill) wasn’t sharp early, but he settled in and had a great start. Each guy we went to after that made some big pitches to get us off the field. Our defense was solid and made some spectacular plays. . . . Every time Mississippi State scored we showed some toughness and were able to respond offensively. I can go on and on about the heroes tonight.”

Friday’s game leaves the two teams tied for first place in the SEC West at 8-5. The No. 2 Bulldogs will look to answer with Austin Sexton on the hill Saturday, as they’ll try to duplicate what they did last weekend at Florida where they also lost on Friday but fought back to win the series.

Strike Three: Gauchos’ Bieber Keeps Rolling

UC Santa Barbara head coach Andrew Checketts refers to junior ace Shane Bieber as his “Mr. Consistency,” mostly for how he can count on Bieber to pound the strike zone. But he’s been giving the 13th-ranked Gauchos much more than that lately, as Bieber authored his second straight complete game in a 1-0 win against Cal State Northridge Friday afternoon.

The Gauchos scored the game’s lone run in the bottom of the first on DH Billy Fredrick’s sac fly. Bieber took it from there, allowing only one hit over the first five innings and finishing with just four allowed. He did have a couple close calls, allowing leadoff doubles in the both the seventh and the ninth, but he was able to get out of dodge both times. A pair of diving plays by the UCSB infield preserved the shutout in the ninth, as the potential tying run was stranded at third.

“Bieber was fantastic today,” Checketts told ucsbgauchos.com. “He was in the strike zone all day and stayed ahead in the count. It’s hard to hit against a guy who’s doing that, especially with the windy conditions today.”

The win was Bieber’s seventh in nine starts, tying him for the national lead, while his ERA dropped to 2.74 in 66 innings. The Gauchos moved to 3-1 in the Big West conference and 22-7-1 overall.

The Lineup

Parker Dunshee, rhp, Wake Forest: Dunshee and reliever Donnie Sellers combined on a three-hit shutout of No. 6 Florida State, a team that came in averaging better than eight runs per game, as the Demon Deacons drilled the Noles 9-0. Dunshee, Wake’s junior ace and only truly reliable starter, worked the first seven frames, allowing just two hits and striking out four.

Johnny Ruiz, 2b, Miami: Ruiz reached base in all six plate appearances (2-for-2, 4 walks) as the top-ranked Hurricanes breezed past Duke 14-2. Ruiz scored two runs and also connected for the go-ahead two-run double in the fourth as the Canes pulled out of an early 2-1 deficit. The Canes have won 12 straight overall and eight in a row in the ACC.

Jordan Sheffield, rhp, Vanderbilt: Sheffield tossed Vanderbilt’s first complete game of the season and was absolutely dazzling against Kentucky, striking out a career-high 14 and allowing just five hits and two walks. Kentucky never even got a runner to third base, while Sheffield completed the game on 124 pitches.

Griffin Canning, rhp, UCLA: Canning’s doing his part to try to turn UCLA’s season around. He’s thrown back-to-back complete games and turned in a gem Friday, outdueling Washington’s Noah Bremer in a 1-0 Bruins win. Canning  struck out 10 while allowing just six hits and one walk.

Eric Hutting, c, Long Beach State: The Dirtbags’ reserve catcher had a moment to shine Friday, getting two hits off the bench, including the game winner, a walk-off single in the bottom of the 12th to beat UC Irvine 3-2. It was just his second RBI of the season, and Friday was also his first multi-hit game.

Johnny York, lhp, Saint Mary’s: The Gaels clinched a vital West Coast Conference series against Brigham Young with a 7-4 win Friday, with York (8.1 IP, 10 H, 4 R, 3 ER, 1 BB, 4 K) leading the way. Pitching on short rest, the junior worked into the ninth inning against the potent BYU offense, including a stretch from the second to the fifth where he retired 12 straight.

Matt Vernon, ss, Appalachian State: The Mountaineers dealt South Alabama its first Sun Belt Conference loss of the year after a 15-0 start, rallying from a 3-1 deficit in the bottom of the ninth to win 4-3. Vernon had the game tying two-run single off USA closer Shane McKinley—after he’d fallen behind in the count 0-2—and later came in to score the winning run on freshman Beau Myers’ bases-loaded walk-off walk.

Mason Cerrillo, dh, Washington State: The freshman Cerrillo’s first-career home run couldn’t have been much bigger, as he clubbed a seventh-inning grand slam that gave the Cougars the lead against No. 10 Oregon State, propelling WSU to the 7-5 upset. The win was just their fourth in Pac-12 play and sets up a rubber game Saturday.

Andrew Zellner, rhp, and A.J. Kullman, lhp, Cincinnati: The two Bearcats hurlers combined to five-hit Tulane in a 2-1 win, Zellner going the first 5 2/3 innings and Kullman going the rest of the way, picking up first career save. Though still just 17-18 overall, UC sits alone in first place in the American at 5-2 after Friday’s series opening win against the 24th-ranked Green Wave.