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22 CAVALIER CORNER one way to do it, and that was to have the players earn what they get based on their per- formance on the field," O'Connor said. Competition ensued in the fall and the pre- season and determined that Edgington, Parker and highly touted first-year Jack O'Connor would get the first crack at the weekend rota- tion. The trio held strong for the first 22 games of the season, a start in which the Cavaliers posted a 20-2 mark. "I've never coached a team to where what your starting rotation was the opening week- end was the same when you start ACC play four weeks later, nor was for sure by the end of the season," O'Connor said. That proved to be true when a line drive struck Parker in the side of the head in the first game of a doubleheader against Florida State. He walked off under his own power and, amaz- ingly, only missed one start. Hungate, a second-year who transferred from nearby VCU after his head coach, Shawn Stiffler, left for the head job at Notre Dame, picked up where Parker left off. The side- arming righty escaped a bases-loaded jam in the first inning unscathed, and he went on to pitch five scoreless innings and struck out five batters, both career highs. The Cavaliers even- tually won in walk-off fashion in 10 innings, ironically with graduate transfer Chris Baker at the plate. "When you're 22 and 23 years old you have a different level of poise out there," O'Connor said. "It's not fast for them. They know how to manage situations, they know how to control the running game, they take time between pitches, they're in control of the game." That influx of talent and experience has been a large part of why Virginia pitching staff boasted the nation's sixth-lowest ERA (3.91) in the regular season. The staff's 554 strikeouts were the 12th most of any staff in the country. It also marked the third consecutive season UVA has totaled 500 or more strikeouts and INFLUX OF INFLUX OF TALENT TALENT A Quintet Of Transfer Pitchers Have Helped UVA Excel BY SCOTT FITZGERALD H ead coach Brian O'Connor and the Virginia coaching staff faced a unique challenge in constructing UVA's roster for the 2023 season. It was evident that professional baseball and graduation would ravage the pitching staff that finished in the top 15 in the nation in both ERA (3.99) and strikeouts (598) in 2022. Gone was UVA's Friday night starter Nate Savino, who was selected in the third round of the MLB Draft by the Arizona Diamondbacks. All-ACC pitcher Brian Gursky, who logged 70 innings in 2022 for the Cavaliers, signed a free agent contract with the New York Mets. Brandon Neeck and Matt Wyatt also were taken in the draft by the Los Angeles Dodgers and Tampa Bay Rays, re- spectively. Will Geerdes and two-way standout Devin Ortiz, who combined for seven wins and over 50 innings last season, exhausted their NCAA eligibility and were signed to free agent deals. Only 32 percent of UVA's innings were slotted to return for the 2023 season. The development of pitchers has been the backbone of O'Connor's teams over the past 20 years. With the emergence of the transfer portal im- pacting all collegiate sports, O'Connor and his staff used it as a tool to plug in Connelly Early, a third-year transfer from Army West Point, slid into the midweek starter role for the Cava- liers in 2023 and flourished. He posted a 10-1 mark with a 3.18 ERA and a staff-best 78 strikeouts in 65 in- nings during the regular season. (Photo courtesy UVA) some of the holes left by the key arms from a season ago. "First and foremost, I believe our program is always going to be built on the development of the high school player," O'Connor said. "But the supplementation of our transfer group is really exciting." Going into the season, the Cavaliers added 21 new players to the roster — 12 first-years, six graduate transfers and three mid-year transfers from four-year institutions. Of the crop of newcomers, five transfers have contrib- uted significantly to the Cavaliers' success on the mound — Connelly Early, Brian Edgington, Nick Parker, Chase Hungate and Angelo Tonas. The question going into the season was where does everyone fit? Who would get to start on the weekend and who will play key roles in the UVA bullpen? For O'Connor, a three-time national coach of the year, the answers were simple. "With so many new faces there was only