Coming off an impressive opening weekend in conference play, Georgia was faced with an entirely new challenge headed into this past weekend traveling to College Station to take on Texas A&M. Any road series in the SEC poses its own set of challenges: different ballpark, opposing fans, different weather, and unfamiliarity with the entire scene, but Coach (Wes)Johnson’s team showed no signs of regression rolling into Friday.

Henry Allen opened the floodgate early on Friday by sending a three-run shot into the stands to give the Dawgs the early advantage, but the work did not stop there. Tre Phelps built off the early lead by hitting a one-run single in the second to help extend the early lead and give the Diamond Dawgs some breathing room. A homer from Michael O’Shaughnessy and a pinch hit bomb from Jordy Oriach created an insurmountable deficit that was far too out of reach for the Aggie offense, leading to a decisive 9-4 victory in Game 1. 

Joey Volchko had a short outing in Game 1 struggling with command issues giving up four walks, but Justin Byrd delivered 4.1crucial innings out of the bullpen to set up smooth sailing for the Bulldawgs to simply do what this team does best: swing it. 

Saturday brought on more of the same from the Diamond Dawgs as Oriach, Phelps, and home run leader Daniel Jackson all left the yard in the first three innings of play, and the damage did not stop there as veteran Kolby Branch lifted a two-run shot out of the park in the later innings. 

Dylan Vigue continued with his dominant start to the season by throwing four innings and striking out five, but the bullpen performance proved even more dominant. Matt Scott entered the game in the fifth looking to keep the Aggies at bay, but he faced some early trouble with command and traffic on the bases. However, he was able to right the ship and give this team five crucial innings out of the bullpen, only giving up a single run in order to preserve valuable innings for the final showing on Sunday.

Although the Diamond Dawgs started the series in a dominant fashion, baseball is one of those games where every day truly is a brand new one, and this was the entire case on Sunday. Pitching struggles and a relatively stagnant offense led to a blowout victory for the Aggies and helped them salvage something from the series.

If there is one thing to learn from the entire weekend, it is simply that this Georgia baseball team is very hard to beat when they put together solid outings on the mound. College baseball can be sporadic, crazy, and entirely unpredictable, but when this team calms the waters during these innings with traffic on the bases, they seem to always respond on the offensive side. Run production will not be an issue for this club, regardless of the talent they face on the mound, because there are simply so many dominant bats in this lineup with violent swings looking to do damage. This team is cohesive and entirely bought into the singular mission of adding another number in the win column every time they take the field. This is something that is completely out of the ordinary for programs with this much star power due to the fact that oftentimes superstars want to do it all themselves. However, this is not at all what this team is about, and they are headed for something special this season based on their early success. 

Georgia will take on Kennesaw State today at home at 3 p.m. and then regroup for another conference showing at Foley Field with the South Carolina Gamecocks rolling into town this Friday for another weekend series.