CLEMSON BASEBALL

Florida State Takes ACC Title with 4-1 Victory


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ST. PETERSBURG, FL - Top seed Florida State used another dominant pitching performance to defeat fourth seed Clemson 4-1 Saturday night in the ACC Tournament Championship Game. The Seminoles won their third ACC Championship in a rematch of the 1997 final, the last year the tournament was held in St. Petersburg. The Tigers (47-14) suffered a loss in the championship game for the fifth time in the last eight years.

Marc LaMacchia (10-1) earned the win for Florida State. He yielded one run on seven hits while striking out four and walking none over eight innings, following Matt Lynch's complete game in FSU's 9-4 victory against Clemson on Thursday. Patrick Hogan (2-1) was credited with the loss despite a solid outing. The sophomore made his first start of the season and allowed only two earned runs on nine hits while striking out five and walking none.

Florida State took a 1-0 lead in the first inning when Blair McCaleb doubled down the right field line to plate Ryan Barthelemy. The lead grew to 2-0 in the third when Stephen Drew took the first pitch of the inning and sent it over the wall in right field.

The Seminoles and McCaleb struck again in the fifth inning. With runners at second and third and two outs, McCaleb sent a 2-2 pitch back up the middle for a two-run single and a 4-0 FSU lead. Clemson finally got on the board in the seventh inning when Michael Johnson hit his 20th home run of the season, this one a solo shot, to make it a 4-1 ballgame.

Johnson went 3-4 with the home run to lead the Tigers and finished the ACC Tournament 12-19 with two home runs and nine RBIs. Khalil Greene extended his hitting streak to 26 games in the sixth inning with an infield single and finished the game 2-4. Johnson, Greene and pitcher Steve Reba were named to the All-Tournament Team with Greene being named the utility player.

Clemson will next participate in the NCAA Tournament starting Friday, May 31. Regional sites, teams and seeds will be announced Monday, May 27.

Post Game Quotes

Clemson head coach Jack Leggett:

"They did a good job pitching against us and I thought at times we hit the ball pretty well. I really thought Baker's ball was out of here that one time, I didn't think there was any question about that one. They hit a couple balls on the nose, they did a nice job turning double plays when they had to. (Blair) McCaleb had two big hits for them, that's all there is to it. I thought (Patrick) Hogan did a great job stepping up for us. He pitched real well. We played good defense. We just couldn't get enough big hits. We made a baserunning mistake in the first inning that cost us a run... it would have been nice to jump out to a lead. They're a good baseball team, they're playing very well right now, they're tough to beat. You make any kind of mistake and they take advantage of it."

"You've got to make plays. You can't make mistakes, and if you make any kind of mistake, a good team like Florida State is going to take advantage of it. We played a good ballgame tonight. We played tough. Our kids played tough after playing well against Wake Forest earlier today. I'm proud of them. We just have to regroup. There's a lot more baseball to be played and hopefully we'll see them (FSU) again."

(on FSU playing well) "Right now they are playing really well. The challenge is for them to maintain it through the regional and the super-regional and on into postseason beyond that if they have an opportunity. But right now they are probably as good as anybody in the country, I can't see anybody playing better than them."

Florida State head coach Mike Martin:

"That was just a tremendous accomplishment. The last two weekends have been two of the most outstanding weekends of my career, but it is a shame that they don't really mean what we would like for them to mean. We have positioned ourselves for post-season play, and the rest is for us to get done.

(On pitcher Marc LaMacchia) "Very impressive performance. He threw the ball well to his location, and really showed a lot of poise. We are very, very proud of him. He has looked better each time he has been out there. He shut down a very good Clemson club. I'll tell you another thing, our defense sure played great behind him."

"We've played very well. I am very proud of these young men."

(On the two Saturday games) "I thought our pitching and defense won the Tournament for us. When you are playing in a ball park with the wind blowing like it is, you've got to get consistent pitching. We got outstanding pitching and outstanding defense. You've got to make pitches and you've got to make plays to win games like that."

(On the upcoming regionals) "I am ready to get back home and play in our ball park. These fans here were tremendous and outstanding, I felt like I was at home, but we are ready to get back to our yard."


Clemson 1 (47-14)

Player AB R H RBI BB SO PO A LOB

Valiente, Roberto lf 4 0 1 0 0 2 1 0 0

Frank, Kyle cf 4 0 0 0 0 0 7 0 0

Greene, Khalil ss 4 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0

Baker, Jeff 3b 4 0 1 0 0 0 2 0 0

Johnson, Michael 1b 4 1 3 1 0 1 3 1 2

Schmidt, Jarrod rf 3 0 1 0 0 0 2 0 1

Green, Zane dh 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1

Slevin, David 2b 3 0 0 0 0 1 2 1 0

Pyzik, Steve c 3 0 0 0 0 0 6 1 1

Hogan, Patrick p 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0

LaMura, B.J. p 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Totals...... 32 1 8 1 0 4 24 3 5

Florida State 4 (56-12)

Player AB R H RBI BB SO PO A LOB

Drew, Stephen ss 4 2 3 1 0 0 3 8 0

McQuade, Tony lf 3 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 0

Barthelemy, Ryan 3b 4 1 1 0 0 1 1 4 0

McCaleb, Blair dh 4 0 2 3 0 1 0 0 0

Brown, Jerrod 1b 4 0 1 0 0 0 10 0 3

Richie, Tony c 4 0 0 0 0 0 6 0 2

Futrell, Mike rf 4 0 2 0 0 1 2 0 0

Smith, Richie cf 4 0 1 0 0 1 2 0 1

Zech, Bryan 2b 3 0 0 0 0 2 2 3 1

LaMacchia, Marc p 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Hodges, Daniel p 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Totals...... 34 4 10 4 1 6 27 15 7

Score by Innings R H E

-------------------------------------------

Clemson............. 000 000 100 - 1 8 1

Florida State....... 101 020 00X - 4 10 0

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E - JOHNSON(7). DP - Florida St. 3. LOB - Clemson 5;

Florida St. 7. 2B - DREW(10); McCALEB(14). HR - JOHNSON(20);

DREW(14). HBP - SCHMIDT. CS - SMITH(3).

Clemson IP H R ER BB SO AB BF NP

Hogan, Patrick 6.0 9 4 2 0 5 28 28

LaMura, B.J. 2.0 1 0 0 1 1 6 7

Florida State IP H R ER BB SO AB BF NP

LaMacchia, Marc 8.0 7 1 1 0 4 29 30

Hodges, Daniel 1.0 1 0 0 0 0 3 3

Win - LaMACCHIA (10-1). Loss - HOGAN (2-1).

Save - HODGES (11). WP - HOGAN(2). HB - LaMACCHIA.

BK - LaMACCHIA 2(3).

Umpires - Home:Tony Maners 1st:A.J. Lostaglio 2nd:Jack Cox

3rd:Scott Graham

Start: 8:06 Time: 2:26 Attendance: 4024

Game notes:

Umpires: LFL - Steve Manders, RFL - Al Davis

HOGAN faced 1 batter in the 7th.

LaMACCHIA faced 1 batter in the 9th.

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