Georgia stays unbeaten with pair of walk-off winners

ATHENS, Ga. — Georgia Baseball stayed undefeated over the weekend with a three-game sweep of Northern Kentucky the included a pair of ninth-inning walk-off winners. The Bulldogs move to 7-0 on the season headed into a week with five contests including four against power conference opponents.

Georgia jumped on Northern Kentucky early Friday afternoon. A 10-run first inning set the Bulldogs up for the run-rule victory. In doing so, the Bulldogs became the first team in program history to score double-digit runs in each of its first five games. The first inning featured a pair of hits each for Logan Jordan and Charlie Condon while Dillon Carter scored on an inside-the-park home run. Dylan Goldstein finished the day with a team-high four RBI, one of five UGA players alongside Jordan, Carter, Clayton Chadwick and Fernando Gonzalez with multiple in the 15-5 win.

Saturday brought about a much more tightly contested game, and one in which Georgia needed some ninth-inning heroics to win it. While the Bulldogs took a 2-0 lead early in the game with an RBI single from Gonzalez in the second and solo home run by Condon in the third, Northern Kentucky tied things up in the fifth.

The Norse had a chance to take the lead, but Kolten Smith entered on the mound and got UGA out of a jam. With runners at first and second and no outs, Smith got a ground out to third that allowed the runners to advance into scoring position on the throw to first before a strikeout and a perfectly executed pitcher fielding practice kept Northern Kentucky from doing more damage.

Georgia faced its first deficit of the series come the eighth inning when a pair of home runs brought three across the plate and put NKU up 5-2. While UGA was able to get one back in the bottom half of the inning, the Norse did the same in the top of the ninth and sent the Bulldogs to the plate with their backs against the wall for the first time this season.

Back to back walks led off the bottom of the ninth for Georgia before Kolby Branch homered to left field to tie the game. Then, just two batters later, Carter sent the Dawgs home victorious with a walk-off home run deep to right field.

“You’ve got to tip your hat to Northern Kentucky because they gave us a tough punch today, and we just kept battling,” Georgia head coach Wes Johnson said on Saturday. “You look back at games like this to remember that you’re never out of a game no matter what. We’ll keep fighting all the way through.”

“When you see some adversity like today, you don’t how a team is going to react, but luckily this team reacted well,” Branch added.

Sunday saw fireworks as well. After a two-run home run put Northern Kentucky ahead in the second, Georgia tied the game in the bottom half of the inning on a bases-clearing double by Sebastian Murillo. It didn’t take long though for the Norse to jump ahead again with yet another two-run home run in the third, taking a 4-2 lead into the fifth.

Northern Kentucky added another run in the fifth, but the show was stolen by the Bulldogs. Murillo led things off with his second double of the day and scored on a Carter home run that left the park in the same spot his walk-off did less than 24 hours before. A double by Condon scored Slate Alford to make it four straight UGA hits. Condon would advance to third with an error on the play, but recorded the first out of the inning after being caught in a pickle by the pitcher on a grounder fielded up the middle.

Georgia didn’t come away without more to show for on the scoreboard though. A two-run home run by Jordan kickstarted a spree from the Bulldog bats as Tre Phelps and Branch followed the home run with ones of their own. It’s the first back-to-back-to-back long balls for UGA since 2021 when the Bulldogs did so in a 14-2 road victory over No. 1 Vanderbilt, hitting seven home runs on the evening. For the freshman Phelps, the home run also represented the first hit of his career.

Northern Kentucky struck back in the sixth with three runs before Georgia did the same with two. That cut effort cut into the UGA lead some, but it wasn’t until the ninth inning that the Norse tied things up. A two-run home run in the eighth and an RBI single in the ninth that scored a leadoff triple knotted things at 11.

Phelps came through big again in the bottom of the ninth. After Condon reached with a single through the left side, he advanced to second on a Paul Toetz walk and third with a wild pitch. An intentional walk to Gonzalez loaded the bases to create a force at home before Phelps was hit by a pitch for the third time on the day to bring Condon across the plate for the 12-11 win.

The three-game series for Georgia against Northern Kentucky was the start of a stretch that’ll see the Bulldogs play 15 games in 20 days. They are back in action with a pair of midweek contests at home, hosting Presbyterian on Tuesday (3:00 p.m. ET) and Michigan State on Wednesday (6:00 p.m. ET). Both games will stream on SEC Network+ before the Bulldogs take on in-state rival Georgia Tech this coming weekend, playing in Atlanta Friday night, Athens on Saturday and at Coolray Field in Lawrenceville to cap the series off on Sunday.