Considering Georgia's start to begin the 2013 baseball campaign, the Bulldogs needed a game like Friday night's 14-2 laugher over visiting UAB. "We definitely needed a game like this and tonight the bats came alive," said sophomore Hunter Cole, who went 3-for-6 and drove in four runs. "That's definitely going to help us and hopefully things will start to snowball these next few weeks." Cole's evening was one of several big performances by Bulldog hitters, who pounded out a season-high 21 hits on the game. In fact, the top four in Georgia's batting order went a combined 14-for-21 with eight runs scored and six RBI. Of the quartet, shortstop Kyle Farmer went 5-for-6 for his first career five-hit game, while leadoff batter Nelson Ward broke out of a recent slump by going 4-for-6. "We were frustrated with our start, but we were disappointed that we hadn't shown what we're capable of offensively," said head coach David Perno, whose Bulldogs improved to 3-6. "But it's starting to come around. You've got to think we're really close, if it's not there." It didn't take the Bulldogs long to get the good vibrations going. Georgia struck for four runs in the first inning off Blazer starter Tanner Bryant (1-1), two coming on wind-blown double to right-center by Jared Walsh, who went 3-for-5. UAB cut the lead to 4-2 with single runs in the second and third, but other than that, Bulldog starter Sean McLaughlin was very much in control, going five innings, retiring the final seven batters he faced. Georgia hitters made certain he would not be hurting for support. The Bulldogs added a run in the third and two more in the fourth on an RBI single by Curt Powell, who was subsequently doubled home by Farmer to make the score 7-2. McLaughlin went five innings for the Bulldogs, giving up just one earned run in five innings on five hits with one walk and zero strikeouts. Blake Dieterich replaced McLaughlin (1-0) in the sixth and allowed just three hits with four strikeouts over the final four innings to pick up the save. "If he (McLaughlin) gets through those first couple of innings he seems to get better, and that's something you like from your ace," Perno said. For good measure, Georgia added three runs in the sixth and four more in the eighth to account for the final score. "It was pretty prevalent we were ready to go, to start a new month and tonight we felt like a new team almost," Cole said. "We came out swinging well, everybody kind of got into the action. This felt pretty good." NOTES: Georgia and UAB continue their three-game set Saturday at 4 p.m. before concluding the series Sunday at 2. … Friday's attendance was 1,542. | 
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