The Diamond Heels’ bats could not be contained in wins against Charlotte and High Point on Tuesday and Wednesday. Carolina set a new season high by scoring 16 runs against both the 49ers and the Panthers and cruised to dominating wins.

Against Charlotte in only Carolina’s second road game of the season, the Tar Heels had to dig themselves out of an early 2-0 hole, but did so quickly. Sophomore Vance Honeycutt came up with the bases loaded in the top of the second inning and cleared them all with the first grand slam of his collegiate career.

Three more runs would score in the inning, two of them on another blast from Alberto Osuna, and Carolina never looked back. Mac Horvath joined in on the fun the next inning with a three-run homer to truly blow the game open. Honeycutt finished the night with a season-high five RBI — the fifth came on a bases-loaded walk in the eighth — and seven other Tar Heels had at least one.

On the mound, starting pitcher Kevin Eaise recovered from the two early runs to hold the 49ers in check across 6.2 innings. Eaise didn’t allow another run to score after the first, allowed just five hits and a walk and struck out eight to earn his second win of the season in the 16-3 rout.

The trip back to Chapel Hill did nothing to cool off the lineup. On Wednesday against High Point, Honeycutt got right back down to business with a leadoff bomb in the bottom of the first, his seventh home run of the season. Honeycutt is now tied for second on the team in homers with Jackson Van De Brake. Only Horvath (nine) has more. Carolina plated seven more runs in the second and third while capitalizing on miscues from the Panthers, including a dropped fly ball and a pair of wild pitches. Osuna homered for the second straight night in the fifth inning and Hunter Stokely added one of his own in the seventh. Honeycutt finished with three RBI, giving him eight across the pair of midweek games and 24 for the season, just one shy of Tomas Frick for the team lead.

Five Carolina pitchers combined to hold the Panthers to just five hits and two runs, with Will Sandy earning the win with 2.2 innings of relief. Of Sandy’s eight outs recorded, five were by way of the strikeout. High Point didn’t record a hit for the final four innings against Dalton Pence, Will Simmons and Carson Starnes.

The Diamond Heels, now 14-5, will now hit the highway for their first road series of the season, visiting Pittsburgh for a three-game set this weekend. First pitch in the first game against the Panthers is scheduled for Friday at 3 p.m.

 

Featured image via UNC Baseball on Twitter

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