ATHENS — The seventh-ranked Georgia baseball team will have its hands full in the first round of the Southeastern Conference tournament Wednesday at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium in Hoover, Ala.
The Bulldogs will face No. 13 Texas A &M. First pitch is slated for 10:30 a.m.
The Bulldogs (42-14), under the direction of coach Scott Stricklin, posted the second-best record in conference action at 21-9 and garnered the No. 3 seed. The top two seeds go to the division winners in Vanderbilt and Arkansas.
The No. 6 seed Aggies (37-19-1) defeated No. 11 seed Florida 8-7 in 10 innings to open the tournament Tuesday. Georgia did not face the Aggies during the regular season. Wednesday’s game will be televised by the SEC Network and be available on the Georgia Bulldog Sports Network. Dave Neal (play-by-play), Chris Burke (color), Ben McDonald (color) and Mike Rooney (field) will be handling the call for the SEC Network.
Georgia has registered its best record in the regular season since the 1990 National Champions went 44-15. Georgia’s 42 wins is the most in a regular season featuring a 56-game schedule and trails only the 1990 club played a 60-game regular season slate. Georgia is batting .275 with a 3.17 ERA and fielding .981.
The Bulldogs are making their 24thall-time appearance in the SEC Tournament. Georgia’s record in the SEC Tournament is 28-45. The Bulldogs are 0-1 versus the Aggies in the SEC Tournament. Last year, No. 18 Texas A&M defeated No. 8 Georgia 7-0 at the SEC Tournament.
On Wednesday, the Bulldogs will start junior right-hander Tim Elliott (6-3, 2.93 ERA) who moved into the SEC rotation for three of the past four SEC weekends, going 1-1 with a 4.26 ERA. He has been named to the Google Cloud Academic All-District Team as selected by CoSIDA. Elliott, a Dean’s List student, carries a 3.57 GPA as a Finance major.
With the final SEC series moved up to Thursday last week, Elliott did not see action against Alabama. In his last start, he did not factor in the decision after going five innings at Auburn and allowed four earned runs on four hits with two walks and three strikeouts. The Aggies have not announced a starter.
Georgia’s offensive leaders this season include junior All-SEC senior 2B LJ Talley (.346-8-40), 3B/Closer Aaron Schunk (.343-11-44; 1-2, 2.53 ERA, 11 SV), graduate DH John Cable (.316-7-45) and redshirt sophomore OF Riley King (.307-8-42). Schunk is a semifinalist for the John Olerud Award given to the nation’s top two-way player by the College Baseball Foundation. Schunk (12 games) and Talley (10 games) enter the SEC Tournament with double-digit hitting streaks.
In the past 11 games, junior SS Cam Shepherd (.232-6-30) has seen his bat come alive as he’s smashed five home runs with 13 RBI. Georgia batted .402 (47-for-117) in the sweep of Alabama to close out the regular season plus posted a 2.33 ERA and was perfect in the field. Cable hit .600 with seven RBI in the series while junior 1B Patrick Sullivan batted .636 (7-for-11) with a home run and four RBI and Schunk hit a pair of home runs and drove in seven.
Stellar defense has been one constant for the Bulldogs as they are on pace to set a Fielding Percentage school record for the second year in a row. Currently, Georgia is fielding .981. Last year, the Bulldogs established the fielding mark at .979. Georgia has been even sharper in league action as it owns an SEC-best .986 Fielding Percentage.
On Monday, Georgia had five players earn All-SEC recognition. Sophomore pitcher Emerson Hancock was named First Team All-SEC, Talley and Schunk made Second Team All-SEC, pitcher Cole Wilcox was part of the Freshman All-SEC squad plus Talley and Shepherd headlined the SEC All-Defensive Team.
Television/Radio at SEC Tournament
TV: Wednesday vs. Texas A&M @ 10:30 am ET (SEC Network)
Radio: Georgia Bulldog Sports Network from IMG College (David Johnston & Jeff Dantzler);
Additional Coverage on Twitter:@BaseballUGA
