No. 14 Vanderbilt at No. 16 Georgia

WHERE: Foley Field

WHEN: Friday 6:30 p.m., Saturday 2 p.m., Sunday 2 p.m.

RECORDS: Georgia 31-14, 12-9; Vanderbilt 29-14, 10-11

STARTING PITCHERS: Friday – Nolan Crisp (1-2, 4.72) vs TBA; Saturday – Jonathan Cannon (8-1, 2.04) vs Chris McElvain (5-3, 3.54); Sunday – Liam Sullivan (3-2, 5.12) vs Carter Holton (5-3, 4.23)

TV/RADIO: Friday-Sunday - SECNetwork+ (Matt Stewart, Jason Jacobs); Saturday – SEC Network (Dave Neal and Chris Burke); Georgia Bulldog Radio Network (Jeff Dantzler and David Johnston).

Sophomore Parks Harber says there’s two reasons he’s swinging the bat for 16th-ranked Georgia the best that he has all season.

“I’m healthy and confident. That’s the two biggest things,” Harber said. “I’ve had conversations with the coaching staff, about just being confident in the box and knowing you’re better than the pitcher. That’s helped me to stay confident and trust my approach. Just stepping into the box, thinking you’re the baddest guy on the field; that’s helped me a lot.”

Harber has certainly been impressive.

After a slow start to the season, Harber may be the most dangerous hitter for Georgia heading into this weekend’s big SEC series against Vanderbilt.

Harber has raised his batting average to a season-high .306, with nine home runs and 43 RBI. As a result, head coach Scott Stricklin inserted Harber into the cleanup spot for Tuesday’s game against Kennesaw State.

He responded by going 3 for 5 with an RBI, an effort that could see even more opportunities with just three weekends to go in the regular season.

“I’ve been lucky that the guys coming up before me have all been doing their jobs,” Harber said. “My job is to get them in. That’s something I take a lot of pride in, doing my job.”

Although Harber flashed as a true freshman for the Bulldogs, a painful wrist injury he suffered as a junior in high school proved a problem. However, after summer surgery to finally correct the issue, the former Westminster standout is back to feeling like his old self.

“He played through that wrist injury all last year and that wrist surgery was a major surgery. He’s got some big scars, so he played through that, and now you’re just seeing him healthy,” Stricklin said. “We knew he had the potential to be a middle of the order type hitter for us, and January and February he was. We couldn’t get him out. He was hitting home runs left and right in our intrasquads.”

Harber admits playing through the wrist injury was difficult.

“The wrist was definitely bothering me a lot, so the surgery last summer was really big for my confidence’s sake,” Harber said. “Today, I’m feeling really good, I’m really comfortable for where I’m at.”

He’s also fairly nifty with his glove.

Harber's ability to play both third base and first enable him to not only remain in the lineup but allows Stricklin to move other players around to keep his best eight position players on the field.

Being able to separate his offense from his defense and not let one affect the other has also been a big part of his growth.

“It can affect you a little bit, but I think the good players can differentiate. (Tuesday night) I had a check swing ground ball that I was upset about, and the last play I had a rocket shot to me at third,” Harber said. “I came in, the coaches said flush it, go out and make a play in the field. The biggest thing is just having two different mindsets and being able to differentiate on the field.”

Do that, and the results will be there.

“Parks is like a lot of our guys, he’s hard on himself. He was upset, but all you can control is having a good at-bat and hitting it hard,” Stricklin said. “He has done that almost as well as anybody, just hitting balls hard. Now, you’re seeing the confidence starting to blossom a little bit.”

Left-hander Jaden Woods has one of Georgia’s most electric arms. But lately, he’s also been one of the Bulldogs’ more frustrating pitchers to watch.

His last three SEC appearances have seen the preseason All-SEC pick allow seven runs in three combined innings against Alabama and LSU, including four home runs. One of those home runs, a two-run walk-off, came in the bottom half of the ninth Sunday in Baton Rouge lifting LSU to a 4-3 win.

When asked about his issues, Stricklin believes it boils down to one thing – a lack of confidence in his breaking ball.

“I think it comes right down to confidence. When the breaking ball is called, he’s got to be confident in throwing that pitch,” Stricklin said. “I was encouraged over the weekend a couple of times, he shook to a breaking ball, where he wanted to throw the breaking ball and that has not always been the case. I think that’s the key, ultimately, for success.”

Woods, who tops out at 95-96 from the left side, worked hard with pitching coach Sean Kenny over the summer to develop an off-speed pitch.

“The breaking ball has gotten better from last year, but here recently it hasn’t been as consistent,” Stricklin said. “I think that’s just more of him mentally just not being as confident as he needs to be in that pitch.”

The Bulldogs need to Woods to get back on track. In Tuesday night’s win over Kennesaw State, Woods showed some positive signs.

The former Houston County standout started the game and set the Owls down in order, including a breaking ball strikeout of leadoff batter Josh Hatcher, one of the better hitters in the Southeast.

“It was good to get him right back out there. Every time you have a bad outing, you want to get back out there as quickly as possible. So, we thought it was important to get him back out there,” Stricklin said. “He led the game off, threw a 3-2 breaking ball and got a strikeout against arguably one of the best hitters in the Southeast. I thought it was a really positive step to go through there and pitch cleanly.”

With a team ERA of 5.38, it’s understandable why some fans are skeptical about this year’s Bulldog baseball team being able to make a deep run into postseason.

With the exception of closer Jack Gowen and freshman Chandler Marsh, Georgia’s bullpen has had issues. If the team wants to make a deep push into postseason, relievers like Woods and others have to improve.

However, per Stricklin, he’s challenging his starting rotation to give them a hand.

“I think the key for us to have success is our starters need to give us more length. For our starters to give us length, which takes pressure off the bullpen,” Stricklin said. “Nolan Crisp was really close to going out there and giving us a seven-inning outing. That’s what you love to see. At Alabama, he was really good for us. Liam is starting to get better.

“Those three starters – Nolan threw four, Jonathan (Cannon) threw five and Liam (Sullivan) threw four, then all of a sudden your bullpen is taxed.”

Of course, Stricklin would also like more consistency from his bullpen.

Getting Woods ironed out would go a long way, but there are others he hopes can turn a corner soon.

Two of those include Will Pearson and Davis Rokose.

Both relievers have struggled, but Tuesday night, Pearson escaped a base-loaded, one-out jam to keep the score 7-2. Rokose, meanwhile, has allowed just one run over his last 6.1 innings.

“Davis Rokose, his last four or five times on the mound he’s been good, and that’s been encouraging.

He’s thrown a lot more strikes and the breaking ball has been better. I thought he made some good pitches (Tuesday) to get out of a jam,” Stricklin said. “Will is having his ups and downs, but he won that game for us. Coming in with the score 7-2 and Hatcher up, and we get out of it with no more runs. It kind of stopped the momentum and put it back on our side.”

Luke Wagner, Garrett Brown, Michael Polk, and Max DeJong are among others Stricklin hopes will find some consistency and step up soon.

“My message to these guys every day is we need all of you. Not everyone is going to have their best outing, have their A-game every single day. It’s the nature of the business,” Stricklin said. “But we need to have guys we can rely on as we get further and further into the season. We need guys to step up.”

With three weekends to go, there’s a lot on the line for the Bulldogs.

At 12-9 in the SEC Eastern Division, Georgia is in a three-way scrum with Auburn, LSU, and Texas A&M for the third-best overall record in the conference.

Both LSU and Texas A&M hold the tiebreaker over the Bulldogs based on their respective series victories. However, there’s still time for Georgia to improve their standings, although the Bulldogs will have their work cut out for them closing with Vanderbilt, top-ranked Tennessee, and Missouri.

Vanderbilt is third in the SEC Eastern Division, two games behind the Bulldogs at 10-11 in conference play.

“There’s six teams vying for the top four right now. Win the series we give ourselves a little separation (from Vanderbilt),” Stricklin said. “We just need to finish strong, and it starts this weekend.”

At 31-14, the Bulldogs are in good shape for a return to the regional, and with a solid finish, could host a regional for the third time in five years.

Currently, both D1Baseball.com and Baseball America have the Georgia hosting one of the 16 regionals in the 64-team field.

“This is the last weekend with students on campus, we need to have a great atmosphere. We just need to. Tickets are sold out, but I don’t think I’ve yet to see very seat filled. We need our season ticket holds who bought tickets to show up,” Stricklin said. “We need everybody here, to be able to play in May and have a series like this on campus, it should be a big deal. It needs to be a big deal, not only to us but our fans.”