WISE – For the first time ever, the UVA Wise baseball team is playing in the South Atlantic Conference Tournament as they earned a berth on the heels of one of the best years in program history.

They will face two-seed and nationally-ranked Lenoir-Rhyne in the opening round Friday evening at 7 p.m., and will play again on Saturday against Carson-Newman or Wingate with the time depending on whether they are in the winner's or loser's bracket.

This is the first post-season appearance by the Cavs since they played in the Mountain East Tournament in 2019, where they lost to Shepherd 5-3 before rallying back for a 19-14 win over Fairmont State. They eventually ended their run (and their time in the MEC) with a 4-2 loss to Notre Dame College.

Tournament and ticket information can be found at the SAC's tournament website, while links to video and live statistics can be found at UVAWiseCavs.com/coverage.

GETTING WISE
- The team enters the postseason as a seven seed with a 26-22 record and finished at 14-16 in SAC play.
- Joshua Morgan leads the team in hitting as he has a .353 batting average with 55 hits, 36 runs, 17 doubles, six home runs and 34 RBI.
- Jacob Boyle is hitting .306 with 34 hits, 18 runs and 20 RBI while Jeb Hurst is hitting .304 with 34 hits and 19 runs. Hurst also has six doubles, four triples, five home runs and 23 RBI.
- DJ Dickson is hitting .299 and leads the team in runs with 38. He also has 50 hits, 14 doubles, six home runs and 29 RBI. The only other player on the team with 30 or more runs is Nick Badgett, who has 32 and is hitting .261 with 43 hits.
- The Cavs have a deep pitching staff, with most of them seeing significant time on the mound. Of pitchers with 50 or more innings pitched Houston Sarvis leads the team with an ERA of 4.62 and a WHIP of 1.34. He also has 51 strikeouts on the year. Spencer Powell has a WHIP of 1.62 and 37 strikeouts. Justin Snider has 44 strikeouts and a WHIP of 1.58

MEET THE OPPONENT
- Lenoir-Rhyne is the two seed and enters the tournament with a 40-10 overall and a 23-7 record in conference play. They swept the regular season meeting with the Cavs March 21-22.
- They are ranked ninth in the latest ABCA poll and seventeenth in the NCBWA poll.
- MacKenzie Wainwright leads the SAC with his .445 batting average and 21 home runs. He is also second in RBI with 66 and fourth in stolen bases with 23.
- Sal Carricato leads the SAC with 78 RBI and is third in batting average with .408. He also is second in home runs with 20.
- Cole Sanford is fifth in the SAC in batting average with .397 and fourth in home runs with 16.
- William Girardi's 2.75 ERA is third in the SAC, while he is also third with 85 strikeouts.
- Andrew Harlow has the fifth-best ERA in the SAC with 3.11. He leads the SAC and is eighth in the nation in strikeouts with 94.

THINGS TO WATCH
- In the other side of the Hickory bracket, third-seed Carson-Newman will face Wingate, who narrowly edged out the Cavs for the sixth seed. This will be the first meeting between the two this season.
- The Cavs took 2-3 from Wingate this season, while Carson-Newman won the series 2-1 and also took a non-conference midweek game from UVA Wise.

UP NEXT
The winner of Friday's game will face the winner of the C-N/Wingate Saturday morning at 11 a.m. The loser on Friday will face the loser of the C-N/WU game Saturday at 3 p.m.

The winner of the bracket will go on to face the winner of the other bracket (which is being played at Catawba) in the championship best-of-three series in Asheboro, North Carolina, May 9-10.