ATHENS — Georgia baseball coach David Perno couldn’t suppress a laugh when asked Thursday if he thought it was about time for his team to get a break.
The Bulldogs (24-18, 8-10 SEC), who opened the season with a consensus top-10 ranking, have had to overcome injury issues and more than their share of bad luck to this point. As a result, they enter the last quarter of the regular season in desperate need of a win streak to reverse their fortunes.
“I thought maybe we’d catch one or two [breaks] this year,” Perno said shortly before boarding the bus for a trip to Baton Rouge, La. “Maybe we’ll catch them late. We’ll just keep hanging in there.”
The Bulldogs lost Tyler Maloof, an 18-save closer a year ago, to an injury before the season. Staff ace Michael Palazzone had to overcome an early-season setback, and Hunter Cole — the team’s leading power hitter — has been out the past six games with a muscle strain.
Meanwhile, Georgia has suffered some excruciating losses. Included was a 16-inning heartbreaker to No. 5 Florida on Friday and a 4-3 disappointment to Georgia Tech on Tuesday night at Turner Field. The Bulldogs will look to turn it around on the road against No. 4 LSU (33-9, 12-6).
“We match up well with LSU,” Perno said. “We’ll just keep leaning on [Friday starter Alex] Wood and Palazzone, and hopefully we’ll get Cole back soon and we can start scoring more runs.”
Time is of the essence if Georgia is to make a fourth consecutive NCAA tournament appearance. The good news is the SEC, in anticipation of expansion to 14 teams next year, is taking 10 teams for the SEC tournament rather than the traditional eight. The Bulldogs are among six conference teams with fewer than nine SEC victories.
“We need to put ourselves in a little better position within the conference,” Perno said. “We don’t want to go in there as the 9 or 10 [seed]. We’re going to have to make a run just to insure our opportunities.”
Perno said the team’s goal is to get to 15 wins in the conference, which would be a .500 record. To do that, the Bulldogs will have to go 7-5 over the final 12 SEC games. After LSU, Georgia gets Auburn (22-19, 7-11) and South Carolina (30-11, 11-7) in back-to-back home series. The final SEC series of the season is on the road against a struggling Alabama team (17-25, 6-12).
“It’s feasible,” Perno said of earning an NCAA at-large berth. “It’s not going to be easy by any stretch, but we just have to win some series. If we can do that and can get a 6 or 7 seed [in the SECs] and play well in the tournament, maybe we get into a regional.”
To do that, Georgia is going to have to hit the ball better. They rank in the bottom third of the league in hitting (.276) and home runs (20).
Georgia’s production has been impacted by the struggles of senior infielder Levi Hyams. After hitting a team-best .332 last season and earning All-Regional honors in the NCAA tournament, he’s batting .222 this season.
“It’s hard to figure,” Perno said. “Curt [Powell] was in a similar position last year, and he kind of turned it around and finished strong for us. Hopefully Levi can do the same.”
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