Georgia Tech will try to make history Monday, and it reached that point with strong pitching, timely hitting and strong defense.
The Jackets need to defeat Southern Miss at 7 p.m. Monday at Russ Chandler Stadium to earn a spot in the Super Regional against Florida. If Tech advances, it will be the first time that it has made it out of the loser's bracket in a regional.
The Jackets made it through by using a stellar five innings of relief by Mark Pope to eliminate Elon 8-4 in Sunday's first game. And then Andrew Robinson, who is normally a reliever, followed him in the night game by starting and throwing five strong innings that stymied Southern Mississippi 10-3.
Tech All-American Deck McGuire (11-1, 3.20 ERA), who threw 121 pitches in Friday's win against Georgia State, will start today's game and will be opposed by Scott Copeland (1-5, 6.23 ERA).
And Tech coach Danny Hall said he wants to see some fans.
"Maybe it would be nice to have more fans rooting for Georgia Tech than for Southern Miss, since we are hosting the regional," said Hall, who has led Tech into the postseason for the 14th time in his 16 seasons on The Flats.
Offensively, Sunday's games were won in different ways.
Tech strung together singles and walks, along with a double, to score seven runs against Elon in the second inning.
The Jackets (38-18-1) used the long ball to win the nightcap. Luke Murton's homer in the first inning easily cleared the scoreboard in left-center field and landed on the football practice field. It made him the first Tech player to reach 20 homers in a season since 1997.
Jay Dantzler followed two batters later with a homer to right center to give Tech a 3-0 lead.
And Cole Leonida, in for Jason Haniger who caught the first game, crushed a homer to center field in the second to give Tech a 4-2 lead.
The defensive issues that cost Tech against Southern Miss in Saturday night's 10-7 loss were absent in Sunday's games.
In the first game, left fielder Chris House caught a fly ball and doubled up a baserunner at first. In the second game, shortstop Derek Dietrich started a nice double play in the fifth on a hard-hit ball that almost wrong-footed him.
But pitching was the story. Pope came in on the fifth against the Phoenix and allowed just four baserunners the rest of the way to pick up his eighth save.
In between games, Hall and pitching coach Tom Kinkelaar asked Robinson if he was ready to make his second start of the year. Colorfully, he said yes.
Other than a bit of trouble in the first in which Southern Miss scored two runs, Robinson allowed just four hits over the next four innings to pick up his first win this season.
"We got great contributions from the guys throughout the day," Hall said. "But the job is not done."
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