Seymour named to the ACC All-Freshman Team

GREENSBORO, N.C. – The ACC announced its 2018 baseball season honors today and among those recognized was Virginia Tech freshman pitcher Ian Seymour, who was one of 12 league players named to the ACC All-Freshman Team.

In his first season in Blacksburg, Seymour led the team with a 4.17 ERA in a team-high tying 13 starts. His 69.0 innings pitched was second on the team along with his three wins and 70 strikeouts. He also led the team in lowest opponents' batting average, limiting the opposition to a .244 batting average.

Against ACC-only competition, the product of Westborough, Massachusetts, was just as productive, making a team-high tying 10 starts and leading the team with a 3.83 ERA and winning two games. He finished second on the team with 51.2 innings thrown and 50 strikeouts, while ACC opponents hit just .258 against him, a team best.

The 70 overall strikeouts are the most by a freshman since the team joined the ACC and were 12 shy of tying the school record held by Pat Pinkman, who struck out 82 in 88.1 innings back in 1998.

During the season, Seymour put himself in select company at the school. With his win over Notre Dame (April 20), he picked up his third win of the season and with it, joined some very short lists for Tech freshman pitchers during an ACC season (since 2005).

First, he became the first freshman ever at the school to win a Game 1 ACC start. Second, he was just the third pitcher with two ACC wins as a starter - joining Justin Wright (2008) and Mathew Price (2009), who also each won two games. Third, he was just the third pitcher with three overall wins as a starter (versus any opponent) - joining Price (2009) and Joe Mantiply (2010), who also each won three games.

And before that, when Seymour struck out 10 in his March 10 start versus Pittsburgh, he joined 15 other Hokies to have struck out 10-plus batters in a game since 2005 and only 11 have done it in an ACC game. Seymour became the first to do it as a freshman. The last freshman with more than 10 in a game was Pinkman, at Dayton, April 18, 1998.

His overall and ACC-only innings were a freshman high for the conference in 2018, while his 50 ACC-only strikeouts tied for the league high with Virginia's Andrew Abbott, who led all freshman with 73 total strikeouts, three ahead of Seymour.