Georgia Tech will open the ACC baseball tournament on Wednesday, and the scheduling for pool play works out fairly well for the Yellow Jackets as they pursue their 10th ACC championship.
In its three-team pool, Tech will play Clemson Wednesday at 7 p.m. in Charlotte, N.C., and Louisville on Thursday at 3 p.m., in pool B. The winner will advance to the semifinals against the pool C winner (N.C. State, North Carolina and Pitt). Tech will have Tuesday and Friday off, having chosen Tuesday as an off day, a perk of winning the Coastal Division.
Aside from both Clemson and Louisville coming into the tournament with a string of series losses, the actual layout of the games benefits the Jackets in a few different ways.
With Clemson and Louisville opening pool play on Tuesday, the Jackets will face Clemson on Wednesday with the Tigers already likely having begun to deplete their bullpen in the war of attrition that the tournament can be.
Another significant benefit of having Tuesday off is that starter Brant Hurter will have another day of rest before going to the mound. Starting pitchers are accustomed to a full week’s rest, and he threw last Thursday against North Carolina.
Being the highest seed also enables the Jackets to play one game where they don’t need to win. In the format of three teams in each of the four pools, if the three teams all finish 1-1, then the highest seed advances, which in this case would be Tech, having earned the No. 2 seed as the Coastal champion.
If Clemson were to defeat Louisville on Tuesday and then Tech were to beat Clemson on Wednesday, that would render the final pool game on Thursday — Louisville vs. Tech — inconsequential, as the Jackets could advance to the semifinal with a 1-1 record.
In that case, coach Danny Hall could play the game with a strategy of making sure his pitching staff is ready for the semifinal rather than needing to win. That might mean saving his intended starter — possibly Andy Archer — for the semifinal. If it were to fall way, that would be a dramatic benefit.
For if Tech were to win the semi, Hall could then throw his No. 3 starter, Marquis Grissom Jr., in the championship. Grissom has given up three earned runs in his past two starts, a total of 10-1/3 innings. That would seem a significantly better option than trying to cover nine innings with a bullpen that likely already will have been taxed by that point.
Also, if Clemson were to lose to Louisville on Tuesday, that would set up a situation in which the Jackets-Tigers game would not have any impact, and Hall could again choose to play that game however he chose. The only game that would matter to Tech in that scenario would be beating Louisville on Thursday, as the Jackets could lose to Clemson and beat the Cardinals and advance at 1-1.
(In that situation in 2019, Hall chose to play to win a meaningless game against Notre Dame, being mindful of wanting to win for the sake of NCAA Tournament seeding.)
There is one potential disadvantage if Tech and Louisville have a winner-take-all game on Thursday. Louisville will have had a day off the previous day, while the Jackets would be playing their second game in less than 24 hours.
But, should Tech advance to the semifinals, the Jackets will go into that game — Saturday at 5 p.m. — with a day’s rest on Friday.
That said, it’s conjecture at this point. Whatever the advantages on paper, the Jackets will have to actually exploit them on the field.
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