Technical Tidbits 5/14

Georgia Tech baseball concluded the season's non-conference schedule on Tuesday night with a disappointing 6-0 loss to Georgia at Turner Field. Starter Cole Pitts had a very solid outing, allowing just one run in five innings before having some sixth inning struggles, which were capped off with a three-run homer by UGA's Daniel Nichols to make it 4-0. The Jackets still have a pivotal series remaining against ACC foe Miami which will decide their seeding for the upcoming ACC Tournament, and winning it feels like necessity at this point. Even if it isn't a 3-0 sweep, a 2-1 series win would go a long way towards boosting Tech's College World Series resume in the event that they don't make another Cindarella run through the ACC Tournament.

Another interesting note from the game is that this week's edition of Clean, Old-Fashioned Hate featured the largest crowd in the entire NCAA this season -- 18,792 made the trek to the Ted for the game. That is a fantastic turnout for any event, much less a college baseball game, and really shows how the competitiveness of COFH this year has increased fan interest. To put that 18,000 number into perspective, just note that two MLB teams don't average that many fans per game -- the Indians and Rays both average under 16,000 per contest.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Tonight&#39;s attendance of 18,792 makes it largest crowd in the NCAA this season! <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/TogetherWeSwarm?src=hash">#TogetherWeSwarm</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/choaspringclassic?src=hash">#choaspringclassic</a> <a href="http://t.co/8L4R7zRiQe">pic.twitter.com/8L4R7zRiQe</a></p>&mdash; GeorgiaTech Baseball (@GTBaseball) <a href="https://twitter.com/GTBaseball/status/598293135962275840">May 13, 2015</a></blockquote>

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If you need a good laugh early this morning, feel free to take a look at this funny "article" from a UGA homer about why exactly Georgia is still the best team in the state. I would normally never take the time to read or link to an article like this, but the way he uses a single victory in a college baseball game as a selling point for why Georgia is making a historic comeback is laughable. I get that the article is from a dwag blog, but it should honestly be illegal to write anything that homer-ish and silly, particularly on a site aligned with Sports Illustrated. The fact that the author attributes everything that Tech has done to luck is proof enough that he is wrong. I guess he can make the argument that Tech is lucky that Georgia consistently fails to meet expectations across all sports, but that's about it.

Although defensive tackle Jabari Hunt-Days is eligible to play at the moment, he still has a number of hurdles to clear before he will be ready for the 2015 season. Hunt-Days, who missed the entire 2014 season as a result of academic ineligibility, did enough to regain his eligibility heading into the offseason but will still have to wait on the results of summer courses to see if he is able to retain that eligibility. If he does in fact play this season (and by most accounts he is on tract to do so), he would be a huge plus for Tech's defense, which should be great this year.

What does the attendance figure of 18,000+ say about the state of COFH?

Have a great Thursday!