I don’t have a lot to say about Virginia Tech football and men’s basketball this week. Football practice just started, players aren’t in full pads yet and there isn’t much news. Basketball starts the NIT on Tuesday, and I don’t think I’ll have much to say there until we find out exactly which players the Hokies will lose at the end of the season. Then we’ll have a much clearer picture of what has to happen in the transfer portal.

So we’ll take a slight pivot for Inside the Numbers this week and take a closer look at the diamond sports. Specifically, we’re going to talk about hitting. Chicks dig the longball, and there are plenty of those to be seen in Blacksburg so far this year.

Let’s start with the baseball team, which is 14-4 and ranked No. 19 this week in the D1Baseball poll. The Hokies are 5-1 in the ACC and are absolutely crushing the baseball, as has become the norm under John Szefc. Some of their ranks:

Home runs: 51, No. 3 nationally*
Batting average: .348, No. 4
Doubles: 44, No. 35
Triples: 9, No. 11
On base%: .441, No. 16
Runs per game: 10.2, No. 8
Sacrifice flies: 13, No. 24
Slugging %: .678, No. 1

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