May 28, 2006

ACC Baseball Championship
Game 14
May 27, 2006
Clemson 16, Georgia Tech 11

Clemson head coach Jack Leggett
Crazy ninth inning. They're a very good offensive team so they are never out of it and I'm just thankful we had a really good offensive inning ourselves and scored 10 runs. Our kids battled hard. I'm proud of our kids. We played a good team and had to come back and play two games in one day. It's been a long day for us and a very short night for us last night and we're back out here again playing. It's just one of those things where I'm just proud of how our team battled today. We could have given up two or three times during that ballgame because they came back and tied it 6-6 and it was the same kind of scenario we had yesterday, but we worked our way out of it. Tough ballgame. We are two evenly matched teams and we just happened to score a few more tonight. We swung the bats well tonight in that ninth inning and that was the story of the game.

Georgia Tech head coach Danny Hall
On Georgia Tech heading into the NCAA Tournament
I think we competed very hard here. I'm very proud of the effort they put forth and how hard they competed. I guess some guys are still banged up. I'm a little worried about (Jeff) Kindel. He doesn't know what happened. When he (Murton) hit the ball he (Kindel) took off to run and he couldn't pick his leg up. He tried to go out and play and said it was still bothering him, so I'm just hoping that there's nothing major wrong with his leg. We're going to need a couple of days just to rest and recoup, but I feel like we competed very hard and played very hard here.

On Kindel's injury
It's in his knee. We just don't know. We'll just have to see how it is in the morning. But he's walking on it so it's not like it's something that he can't walk on.

On whether he would like to be put in a different bracket from Georgia in the NCAA Tournament
I would like to be in a different bracket. We play them all the time and to have to go at them again to try to get to Omaha, we've had to do that a lot. We'll see what happens.

On what he saw in his team this week that is encouraging for next week
I thought our starting pitching was really good, so that was impressive. We've just had different guys at different times step up and do the job offensively. I was impressed with the way we played.

Georgia Tech freshman 1B Luke Murton
On whether he has ever had a game like tonight (3-for-5, 3 HR, 7 RBI)
No, actually this is my first three-home-run game I've had in my career. In high school I had two numerous times, but I've never had a three-home-run game. ... In the counts I had I was taking an aggressive swing, so I was just trying to hit the ball hard.

On whether that momentum will carry over into the regional
It's a time that you want to get hot, because this is a time where you can really help your team out. And that's what you do as a baseball player, you prepare and you work hard so you can help your team out. And to get hot at this time I hope I can stay hot and help the team win the Regionals, win the Super Regionals and make it to the World Series.

Georgia Tech senior CF Steven Blackwood
On whether he would like to be put in a different bracket from Georgia in the NCAA Tournament
I would love for them to do something else. I would rather face them in Omaha in all reality. Rivalries, once you get into the NCAA Tournament, and even when you're in the season, any sort of rankings or anything like that, you put them aside and no matter what you do, it just becomes a grudge match. With the way that Georgia's been playing and the way that we've been playing, I think that in all honesty it would be unfair for two very good teams to be paired against each other going in for Super Regionals before making it to Omaha. I think those would be two of the top teams in the country to be paired up in Omaha if we got put in their bracket up there instead of paired up in a Super Regional. With the hot streak that they've been on they've become somewhat of a feared club, but at the same time, we've gone on a tear recently and rattled off some big wins against Miami, beating Clemson earlier today and then putting up a big fight here. That definitely shows our potential, taking on one of the top teams if not the top team, in the country.