Georgia Bulldogs open 2014 baseball season against Georgia Southern

Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

While Georgia Tech’s baseball season got underway yesterday with a 6-5 win against Old Dominion, the Georgia Bulldogs had to delay their opening game because of weather.

Instead of playing a standard weekend series with a game on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, the Bulldogs will push back Friday’s game into a double header with Georgia Southern starting at noon Saturday.

This is an exciting time for Georgia baseball fans as it marks the beginning of new head coach Scott Stricklin’s career with UGA. Stricklin was previously the head coach at Kent State, where he led the Flashes to five NCAA regionals and an appearance in the 2012 college world series. The last time Georgia made it to Omaha was back in 2008, where the Dawgs were eliminated by Fresno State in the championship round.

Stricklin will be trying to lead the Bulldogs to their first National Championship since 1990.

Here are the pitching matchups for this weekend’s series:

• Game 1 (Saturday, noon) – RHP Sean McLaughlin (UGA) vs. LHP Sam Howard (GSU)
• Game 2 (immediately after Game 1) – LHP Ryan Lawlor (UGA) vs. RHP Josh Wirsu (GSU)
• Game 3 (Sunday, 1 p.m.) – LHP Patrick Boling (UGA) vs. RHP Ryan Frederick (GSU)

Stricklin told GeorgiaDogs.com that he was considered about the depth of the team, but that he was confident in the starting pitching and the talent of the lineup:

"“I like the depth of our pitching staff, and our lineup, when healthy, will be good. However, we lack depth among our position players,” said Stricklin. “We need to be healthy by the start of SEC play. We’ve got a great group of kids; they have handled the transition well. We’ve pushed them hard, and they’ve responded well. I like where we are and we’ll see what happens starting Friday.”"

Be sure to check back later for a full recap of the double-header and follow us on twitter (@ATLBeatBlog) as well as the Georgia baseball team (@UGAdiamonddawgs).