Jim Morris is entering his 16th season as UM
FROM CBB NEWS SOURCE
CORAL GABLES, Fla. – Home series against Florida State, Georgia Tech and NC State and road trips to Florida, Virginia, Clemson and North Carolina highlight the 2009 University of Miami baseball schedule, as announced Friday by 16th-year head coach Jim Morris. The Hurricanes, who will play at the newly renovated Alex Rodriguez Park at Mark Light Field this season, open the 2009 campaign on Friday, Feb. 20 against Rutgers.
Thirty-eight of UM’s 54 regular season games will be played inside the state of Florida, with 35 of those games to be played at Alex Rodriguez Park at Mark Light Field. UM is also slated to play 22 games against eight different schools that reached the NCAA Tournament in 2008.
After the opener against Rutgers on Feb. 20, the Hurricanes will face the Scarlet Knights three more times over the next two days, with two seven-inning games slated on Feb. 21 before the two teams close out the series with the fourth game on Sunday, Feb. 22.
The following weekend, UM makes its only non-conference weekend road trip when it travels to Gainesville to take on Florida, Feb. 27 to March 1.
The team then returns to Coral Gables for its longest homestand of the year with 12 games in a span of 16 days from March 3 to March 18. During that stretch, the `Canes will take on Rhode Island, Mount St. Mary’s, St. Joseph’s (Pa.), Pittsburgh, St. Thomas and UMBC in mid-week games, as well as NC State (March 6-8) and Duke (March 13-15) in ACC weekend series.
Miami’s first ACC road trip of the year comes March 20-22, when the Hurricanes head to Charlottesville, Va. to battle the University of Virginia. Following that weekend, UM will play a pair of mid-week games against Ohio State at home (March 24) and at FAU (March 25).
Arguably the toughest stretch of the season comes in late March and early April, with home series against Georgia Tech (March 27-29) and Florida State (April 3-5) followed by a road trip to Clemson (April 10-12) all coming in a span of two-and-a-half weeks.
The Hurricanes will follow that stretch up with another difficult conference test – a series at North Carolina, April 17-19.
Following the team’s trip to Chapel Hill, the `Canes will play six straight at home from April 22-29, beginning and ending with a pair of games against Florida Gulf Coast on April 22 and April 29. In between those two contests, Miami will host Virginia Tech from April 24-26 before North Florida visits Coral Gables on April 28.
The month of May features Miami’s northernmost trip of the season (at Boston College, May 1-3), its final regular season home series (Bethune-Cookman, May 8-10) and its regular-season finale (at Wake Forest, May 14-16).
After closing out the regular season in Winston-Salem, N.C. on May 16, the Hurricanes will make the short trip east to Durham for the 2009 Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament, May 20-24, at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park. The 2009 UM baseball team features 19 returning players – including 16 letterwinners – from last year’s team that reached the College World Series and finished with an overall record of 53-11. Among the players returning this season include sophomore left-hander Chris Hernandez – Collegiate Baseball’s National Freshman Pitcher of the Year – and junior shortstop Ryan Jackson, a first-team All-ACC selection in 2008. Joining the returning group is a 13-member newcomer class that features five players selected in the 2008 Major League Baseball Draft and a total of nine players from the South Florida area. Miami’s television schedule will be announced at a later date.
2009 College Baseball Schedule- Miami
