KNOXVILLE — Tennessee’s baseball team has been offensive in its first four games of the 2020 season. The Volunteers have used the long ball in a season-opening sweep of Western Illinois and a midweek victory over Charlotte on Tuesday.
Through four games, the Diamond Vols have scored 53 runs and pounded out 46 hits, including 19 that have gone for extra bases.
Tennessee is leading the Southeastern Conference with eight home runs. It took the Big Orange (4-0 in 2020) 10 games to club 10 round-trippers last season when Tennessee went 40-21 and reached the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2005.
Zach Daniels, Jake Rucker and Austin Knight have each gone deep twice this year for the Vols. Connor Pavalony and Max Ferguson have also homered this season for Tennessee, which plays in the inaugural Round Rock Classic this weekend.
Tennessee opens the event against Texas Tech Friday at 8 p.m. The Red Raiders are also 4-0 and made it to the College World Series in 2019.
The Vols play Houston (1-2) on Saturday at 3 p.m. before closing out the weekend against Stanford (1-3) on Sunday at noon.
Houston lost two out of three to Youngstown State at home last weekend. The Cardinal dropped two of three against Cal State Fullerton. Stanford beat the Titans 2-1 on Sunday after losing lopsided games on Friday and Saturday.
The Cardinal fell to Santa Clara 3-2 on Tuesday.