After a breakout sophomore season where he led the ACC with 111 strikeouts, UNC right-hander JB Bukauskas was invited this week to join the 2016 USA Baseball Collegiate National Team.
He becomes the 27th Tar Heel all-time to represent the school as part of a U.S. national squad–and first since Skye Bolt in 2013.
“I am very thankful for the opportunity to play for our country this summer,” Bukauskas said. “I’m extremely excited to help the team in whatever way possible and am looking forward to getting started.”
The native of Ashburn, Virginia possesses a fastball that can reach as high as 97 mph, as well as a devastating 88 mph slider that showed massive improvement in 2016.
Bukauskas improved a great deal from his freshman to sophomore year, showing off a slider in 2016 that was nowhere near as effective in 2015. (Joe Bray/ UNC Athletics)
In conference play–where he started 10 games against top-level ACC hitters–opponents hit just .223 against him.
Relying heavily on just those two pitches, Bukauskas also led UNC with a 7-2 record as the Saturday starter and was named Second Team All-ACC.
These accomplishments helped establish him as one of the top power pitchers in the country.
Now he’ll get a chance to prove that statement this summer against some of the best competition the world has to offer.
“This is a tremendous opportunity for J.B. and I have no doubt that he will be an outstanding addition to the Collegiate National Team,” Carolina head coach Mike Fox said. “Getting to represent the United States in international competition is an incredible opportunity and I know J.B. will handle himself with nothing but class.”
After training in Southern California, the team will travel to play three international friendship series with Chinese Taipei (July 5-9), Japan (July 12-17) and Cuba (July 23-27).
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