NC State takes Game 1 from Miami, 11-5

NC State’s bats continued to stay hot for the second straight game as the Wolfpack took the first game of their series against Miami by a score of 11-5. Tyler McDonough, Luca Tresh, Devonte Brown, and Jose Torres each homered for the Pack.

Miami drew first blood by tacking a run on the board in the top of the 1st inning without recording a hit. Leadoff hitter Jordan Lala was grazed by a Evan Justice pitch, moved up two bases on a pair of passed balls, and scored on a sacrifice fly by Adrian Del Castillo.

NC State tied things up in the bottom half of the 1st thanks to some shoddy Hurricanes defense. McDonough reached on an error by Lala that put him on third base, and subsequently scored on a passed ball strikeout with two outs. Sometimes you’re lucky.

The Hurricanes scored again in the 2nd inning, with the runner who crossed the plate again reaching base without a hit and scoring on a play that was not a hit - this time a fielder’s choice ground out.

After a couple scoreless half innings, the Wolfpack bats came alive in the bottom of the 3rd. McDonough led off the inning with a massive solo home run to dead center field. Tresh then decided to murder a baseball himself and sent a no-doubter over the left field wall to give State their first lead of the day at 3-2. The home run was Tresh’s 7th of the year (in eight games). State would tack on two more runs in the inning to push the advantage to 5-2. Sometimes you’re good.

Because this is NC State, nothing is easy, and Miami tied things up in the bottom of the 4th inning. After two quick outs by Justice, he walked the next two batters after getting a bit too cute trying to work the edges of the zone. After the walks, he gave up a 3-run opposite field home run to Lala which tied things up at 5 a piece.

From there, though, it was all NC State.

Torres led off the bottom of the 4th with his first home run of the year, a shot to left center field. Tresh would later single in McDonough, who reached on a double, and then Brown would crank out his first home run of the season, a 2-run oppo shot to right field.

That staked the Wolfpack to a 9-5 advantage. Justice settled in to toss two more scoreless frames and Reid Johnston came in to close out the final three innings without giving up a run.

The final two NC State runs would score in the 5th inning following a Torres double plus a Lala error that scored Vojtech Mensik and a McDonough RBI groundout that pushed Torres across.

McDonough (2-5, 2B, HR, 3 R, 2 RBI), Torres (2-4, 2B, HR, 2 R, 2 RBI), Tresh (2-4, HR, 2 R, 2 RBI, BB), and Jonny Butler (2-5, R, 2 SB) each tallied multiple hits on the day. Brown (1-4, HR, R, 2RBI, BB) reached base safely twice.

No Miami player recorded multiple hits on the day, although Lala (1-3, HR, 2 R, 3 RBI, 2 HBP) and Alex Toral (1-3, R, BB) each reached base safely multiple times.

Justice (6.0 IP, 3 H, 5 R, 4 ER, 4 BB, 9 K) had easily his best outing of the season, although his control issues (4 BB, 1 HBP, 3 WP) prevented him from having more success on the day. Johnston (3.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 K) was great in relief in earning the save, the fifth of his Wolfpack career - and first since his Freshman All-American year in 2018.

Game two of the three-game series is Saturday at 2:00pm.