Preview Virginia Tech Hokies vs #4 Louisville Cardinals

Virginia Tech makes the road trip over the mountains to the southern banks of the Ohio River to face the Louisville Cardinals in what is, without any doubt in Hokie fans' minds, a must win, any win situation.  Even with the matchup, Tech has to figure out how to stop this losing streak or risk an absolute end to the season after the last game.

We don't have a big recent history with Louisville.  There is a long history between 1979 and 1995, but the nearly annual visits stopped at that point.  Saturday will be the first game between the schools since April 30, 1995, so comparisons are of little use; the gap has officially reached drinking age.

There was a definite advantage to the Hokies over that span with the 57 game record standing at 45-12.  With Louisville recently ranked at #4 it is unlikely that the weekend's games are going to be close to the old domination.  Louisville has a solid winning team and Tech will have its hands full just trying to pull off a win, much less a series or sweep.  Louisville's current record is:

The Cardinals have nine batters with an average above .250, and 8 above .300.   Starting Catcher Colby Fitch is leading the team with a whopping .512 batting average (Yes, you read that correctly I did a triple take just to confirm It.) and he isn't the team leader in hits, RBI's and Home Runs.  That honor belongs to Outfielder Cory Ray, whose stats start off with a stellar .336 Average, that's backed up by 28 runs, 36 hits, 32 RBI, and a massive .636 slugging percentage.

The Hokies have to bring a different kind of game to this lineup.  The ACC Currently looks like this:

Atlantic

Coastal

In case you didn't notice that Tech is unfortunately in the basement of both the Costal, and the entire Conference.  We are on track to play a final game on May 21^st.  Unless we start getting some ACC wins, well any wins, we are unlikely to make it to the ACC Playoff Tournament.

This weekend the series starts off on with a Saturday 1^st game.  The final game will be played on Monday evening at 7pm before a rush home to meet William and Mary for a Military Appreciation Day.  Somewhere in that busy game schedule the Hokies need to salvage a little pride and find themselves on the winning end of a 9^th inning.

Short of a miracle, though, Louisville is playing at a much higher level than we are, sort of like a High A team put up against an AAA squad.  Here's hoping for the best.

GO HOKIES!!!!