Charleston Southern at Georgia

WHERE: Foley Field

WHEN: Friday 5 p.m., Saturday DH 2 p.m.

RECORDS: Georgia 10-3, Charleston Southern 5-8.

STARTING PITCHERS: Friday – LH Jaden Woods (2-0, 2.84) vs LH Ryan Gleason (1-2. 6.97); Saturday – Game 1: LH Liam Sullivan (2-0, 0.59) vs RH Evan Truitt ((0-2, 4.41); Game 2: RH Nolan Crisp (1-1, 4.820 vs LH Sam Massey (0-1, 8.22)

So much for Scott Stricklin’s hope of keeping Charlie Condon’s name under the radar and off the minds of opposing teams.

What the redshirt freshman has done 13 games into the season has become impossible to ignore. Entering this weekend’s three-game set against Charleston Southern, Condon has become one of the top individual stories in all of college baseball after batting .490 with six home runs and 29 RBIs. His 29 RBIs tie him with Troy’s Shane Lewis for most in the entire country.

“The thing that I wanted to be cautious with was not to overhype him early to put undue pressure on him, just let him go out there and play,” Stricklin said Thursday in a telephone interview with UGASports. “He’s done that, so now he’s got the hype. Everybody is starting to talk about him, and the media has certainly picked up on it. But that’s who he is, so there’s no hiding him anymore, and now people are going to be really careful with him.”

Physically, Condon certainly stands out. At 6-foot-6 and 220 pounds, Condon was the Co-Player of the Week after hitting (.588) in four games last week with three home runs and eight RBI. He may be a repeat winner. In Georgia’s two-game sweep of Georgia Southern, he notched his first career triple, hit two home runs Wednesday, and has driven in nine runs. He’s hit in 12 straight games.

“That’s the good thing about our lineup. You’ve got Connor Tate (batting .480) in front of him, Parks Harber (.256-6-17), and Corey Collins (.324-4-9) behind him.

It’s tough to pitch around him just because of who is batting behind him,” Stricklin said. “Early in the season, I think we were playing Princeton and Charlie was hitting behind Parks. They walked to Parks to get to Charlie, and I don’t think you’ll see that anymore. You’re going to start to see Charlie getting some walks and pitched around, that’s why it’s important for the guys behind him to hit well.”

Condon hits the ball as hard as any Bulldog in recent memory. Exit velocities are routinely recorded at 110, 111, and 112 mph, a testament to the work Condon put in last year while redshirting as a true freshman.

The former standout at The Walker School was under 200 pounds when he first arrived. Per Stricklin, he’s now at least 220.

“This time last he was in the weight room and eating constantly, putting on weight, getting stronger and I think you’re starting to see the results of that,” Stricklin said. “You see it in football all the time, guys come in that are really talented, but you redshirt them, they put on weight, they come back and are different guys. Charlie was certainly talented, but he did, he needed to put on some weight and strength. He did it, he went about it the right way.”

Condon isn’t the first player under Stricklin’s watch in 10 years as Georgia coach to go the redshirt route and come stronger, better players.

“Connor Tate redshirted, Ben Anderson redshirted, Riley King redshirted, Mason Meadows … those were all great players who have done that,” Stricklin said. “Charlie bought into it, he handled it perfectly and now he’s getting the benefit of it.”

Stricklin said the weekend statuses for catcher/outfielder Corey Collins and third baseman Park Harber are unclear due to recent injuries.

Collins tweaked his hamstring running the bases Wednesday night at Georgia Southern, while Harber continues to be bothered with a hand injury that cropped up last week.

“We may have to do some resting and some load management with Corey and Parks to make sure they’re healthy for next weekend,” Stricklin said. “We obviously want those guys in the lineup but we need them healthy, too. Playing five games in six days is hard on the body, and we’re seeing a little bit of … nothing serious … but those guys are nicked up.”

Stricklin said both players may be a game-time decision.

One player who will not be available is backup outfielder Dwight Allen II. Allen suffered a hamate bone injury Saturday at Georgia Tech and is scheduled to undergo surgery on Wednesday.

“He’ll get it taken care of early next week, I believe it’s Wednesday when he is getting that taken care of,” Stricklin said. “We’ll lose him for a couple of weeks after that, but he did that at the Georgia Tech game.”

Stricklin was encouraged by what he saw from freshmen pitchers Kolten Smith, Matthew Hoskins, and Leighton Finley in Wednesday’s 9-4 win at Georgia Southern.

Smith was just one batter over the minimum with four strikeouts before being charged with a run in the fourth. It might have been more had Hoskins not slammed the door, allowing just one run to score.

Finley, meanwhile, struck out the side in the sixth before allowing a pair of runs in the seventh.

“I thought all three were really good. With Kolten, the plan was to do three innings and three innings only, but he was so efficient with those first three, was just one over the minimum, and gave up one hit, we got a little greedy. His pitch count was low, so we put him out there for the fourth,” Stricklin said. “That was his limit. He got in a little trouble in the fourth, but Hoskins came in and got him out. We’ve all seen Matthew and know how good he is, but we’ve got Kolten and Hoskins are recovering from illnesses and we’re still trying to get them back to 100 percent.”

Despite allowing two runs in the seventh, Stricklin liked what he saw from the former Richmond Hill star.

“We were really encouraged by that. That’s the way he’s been throwing in intrasquad's,” Stricklin said. “He threw really well in that first inning, in the second inning he kind of hit a wall a little bit, but bottom line his stuff was really good in that first inning when we needed it and he got us through that inning clear.”

Stricklin was also encouraged by lefty Collin Caldwell and righty Will Pearson, two relievers who struggled mightily in 2022, but so far, appear to be back on track.

Caldwell cleaned up Finley’s mess in the seventh by not allowing any more runs, with Pearson shutting down the Eagles on a walk with two strikeouts over the final two innings.

“That’s the Will that we saw his freshman year. We need him. We need him to be a guy who can eat some innings. He can certainly get right-handers out, but Georgia Southern had seven lefties in their lineup and he handled them really well,” Stricklin said. “Collin Caldwell came in and got two big outs, so we were encouraged all the way around with all the guys who threw last night.”

Sophomore pitcher Coleman Willis has yet to appear in a game this year, and according to Stricklin, there’s a reason why.

“We’re just trying to get him on track. He’s a really hard worker, he’s got good stuff. He’ll throw live today in intrasquad,” Stricklin said. “He’s trying to get his confidence, and that’s the biggest thing. He’s really talented, he’s a hard-working kid, and nobody wants it more than him. We’ve just got to get that confidence going.”

Willis was scheduled to throw an intrasquad game Thursday afternoon.

With the former Houston County standout, it’s certainly not a question of talent. The 6-foot-7 right-hander was ranked 120 among Baseball American’s Top 500 prospects for the 2021 Major League Draft after going 9-2 with a 1.40 ERA his senior year.

“He’ll throw intrasquad today and hopefully he can continue to make progress. If he does, we’ll start to see him,” Stricklin said. “He’s a guy we’d love to have on the mound, but we’ve got to get him right. He’s working hard, he’s staying positive, and he was on the trip with us. He’s been a great teammate and we hope to get him out there.”