It wasn’t supposed to go this way.

After getting swept at home this weekend by Notre Dame, the Virginia baseball team sits at just 7-8 overall and 2-7 in ACC games. That’s both the Cavaliers’ worst record through 15 games, and worst conference record through three ACC weekends of Brian O’Connor’s 18-year tenure as head coach.

“I’ve done a horrible job, candidly, preparing this team,” O’Connor said bluntly after Saturday’s 12-5 loss to the Fighting Irish. “I’m the coach; I accept full responsibility for it. It’s not the players’ fault. It’s my fault.”

A month ago, the Hoos were ranked in the top 20 of every major college baseball preseason national poll. They peaked at No. 2 in the country according to Baseball America a week into the season, after taking two of three from UConn to open the schedule.

That preseason excitement stemmed largely from the return of all nine regulars from a lineup that was one of the best in the country last year. The Wahoos hit .309 as a team with 22 runs and averaged nine runs in 18 games before the 2020 season was halted in mid-March amid the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

They haven’t been able to match that production through the first month of this season. The Cavaliers are hitting .227 and averaging 4.7 runs in 15 games; in nine ACC games, those numbers dip further, to a .178 team batting average and 2.7 runs per game. UVa has just five home runs on the year.

Eight of Virginia’s nine regulars were hitting better than .300 when the season abruptly ended last March. This year, none is hitting above .300; at .294, catcher Logan Michaels is leading the team’s regulars in batting average. He doesn’t see a difference in the UVa’s collective approach from last year to this season.

“Everybody’s working hard. It’s not like we’re just sitting down and doing nothing,” Michaels said after a 4-for-4 day in Sunday’s 8-3 loss. “Obviously we realize we’re all struggling, but just trying to stay positive in any possible way, and work through it. Obviously there’s not a magic wand that’s just going to be like, ‘Oh, here we go. Everything is going to turn around.’ So the big thing is just showing up every day and trying to earn it.”

According to O’Connor, the Cavaliers have not done enough to earn wins this year, especially in their first three conference weekends.

“We’ve got to put the ball in play better with two strikes,” he said. “We’ve got to be tougher. We just struck out way too much. More competitiveness in every facet of the game is going to be required for us to have success in this league. And that’s what we’re not doing right now.”

O’Connor has expressed confidence that his team’s veteran hitters will come around but he has tried 12 lineups through the Cavaliers’ first 15 games. Only three players have started every game for the ‘Hoos; six started all 18 last year. Max Cotier (.196), Devin Ortiz (.136) and Alex Tappen (.109) are all hitting below the Mendoza line early this season. All three were out of the lineup on Sunday, though Tappen did enter as a pinch-hitter in the fifth inning.

First-years Kyle Teel and Jake Gelof have worked their way into the lineup the last two weeks. Teel has been the designated hitter in five of the last seven games while Gelof started the last two at second base. The two freshmen combined for five hits and three RBI against Notre Dame, including a pair of solo home runs from Teel.

“They’ve stepped up and been aggressive and competitive,” O’Connor said, “and the game rewards you when you’re that way.”

While the lineup has consistently struggled early in ACC play, O’Connor was able to rely on his pitching staff during the first two weekends at North Carolina and Florida State. UVa entered the Notre Dame series with a 2.68 team ERA through 12 games, including a 3.06 ERA in conference games.

But as he admitted on Sunday, the Fighting Irish “beat us up in every way possible.” Notre Dame scored 30 runs over the three-game weekend, hitting .365 with seven homers. And the Irish were relentless: When UVa erased an early 2-0 hole with a four-run third inning on Friday, Notre Dame responded with three runs in the top of the fourth. On Saturday, after the Wahoos tied the game with three in the fourth, the Irish put up five in the top of the fifth. UVa pitchers retired the side in order just five times all weekend.

Lefty Andrew Abbott had pitched into at least the sixth inning of each of his first three starts but on Friday, he gave up six runs and threw 102 pitches in just 4.2 innings. Griff McGarry made it through just 3.2 innings on Saturday, giving up three runs and throwing 82 pitches. And on Sunday, Mike Vasil gave up a first-inning three-run home run then had to leave the game in the second because of a back issue. It was the first time since last February that Vasil didn’t pitch at least six innings.

“We were hoping that it would loosen up and he would be fine, and it just didn’t,” O’Connor explained.

That put a heavy burden on the UVa bullpen, which couldn’t contain Notre Dame’s offense all weekend. O’Connor used four relief pitchers on Friday, five on Saturday and six on Sunday. Five relievers—Blake Bales, Brandon Neeck, Kyle Whitten, Zach Messinger, and Matt Wyatt—made multiple appearances against the Irish; closer Stephen Schoch was used for three innings on Sunday, first entering the game in the fifth inning.

As a staff, UVa finished with an 8.33 ERA against the Irish raising the team ERA for the season by more than a run, to 3.85.

“Our pitching has been, candidly, really spectacular the whole year, and it wasn’t this weekend,” O’Connor said. “That’s a credit to Notre Dame and it’s a credit of lack of execution on our part. It’s a result of lack of execution. There’s many times that we were calling for the fastball to be thrown in, and we were throwing the ball away. Now, tip your cap to Notre Dame, they capitalized on the opportunity.

“And so that’s what we need to do a better job of is executing, in all facets of the game, and competing a little bit more,” he added. “Those are the things that it takes every day, that if you do those things every day and you’ve got enough talent, you’re going to be successful. And those are the things that we’re not doing real well right now.”

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