Cards Drop Final Road Game at No. 3 Virginia Tech

Mark BlankenbakerMay 16, 2022

The sixth-ranked University of Louisville baseball team wrapped up the road portion of its schedule with a 6-4 loss at No. 3 Virginia Tech on Sunday.

Louisville (35-15-1, 16-10-1 ACC) has four games remaining on its regular season schedule, all at Jim Patterson Stadium. The Cards will host Eastern Kentucky on Tuesday and then wrap up the regular season with Virginia at home Thursday-Saturday.

Carson Liggett helped get the Cardinals off to a strong start on Sunday in his second career start on the mound. The freshman retired the first nine batters he faced in order over the first three frames.

Virginia Tech (36-11, 16-9) changed that in the fourth, taking a hit by pitch to start the inning before a two-run homer opened the scoring.

Louisville responded well though, answering back with two runs of their own in the fifth.

Noah Smith laid down a bunt for a hit with one down and Jack Payton drew a walk to give the Cards a pair of baserunners. The Hokies appeared to be out of the inning, but a groundball by Ben Metzinger was mishandled loading up the bases.

Dalton Rushing stepped to the plate and fell behind in the count 0-2 but battled back and rolled a grounder through the shifted infield to bring two runs home and tie the game.

The next three runs belonged to Virginia Tech however, as the Hokies pushed one across in the sixth and two more in the seventh.

Louisville wasn’t done though. Rushing hit his team-leading 17^th home run of the season over the bullpen in right field in the eighth to make it a two-run game and Levi Usher singled home pinch-runner Chris Seng later in the inning to get the Cards within one.

Virginia Tech got one of the runs back in bottom half of the eighth, leaving the Cardinals needing two to tie in the ninth.

In the ninth, Brandon Anderson was hit by a pitch with one down and Ben Bianco singled into left field to put the tying runs on base. Payton then hit a deep fly to left-center, but the ball came up just a few feet short of the wall and was caught on the warning track for the second out. A force out then ended the rally and the game.

Rushing and Usher each had two hits on the day and combined to drive in all four Louisville runs.