When the Georgetown baseball team had the chance to improve its standing in the Big East with a series against the evenly matched Cincinnati Bearcats last weekend, the Hoyas let the opportunity slip away and got swept, 3-0 on the series.

This time, however, facing a comparable South Florida team, Georgetown bounced back from a 14-3 loss last Friday to take the remaining two games, 4-3 and 2-0, and move into ninth place in the conference standings. The Hoyas (21-25, 7-11 Big East) are now within reach of the eight-team field that will go to the Big East tournament at the end of the month, while the Bulls (20-25, 9-12) hang on the edge, currently in eighth place.

“We’re feeling pretty good right now,” Georgetown Head Coach Pete Wilk said. “Last weekend was a testament to this team’s character. . When you take a beating like we did on Friday night, usually it takes the wind out of your sails, but this team is pretty tough and resilient.”

The Bulls wasted no time getting a lead on Friday, as senior catcher Brian Baisley hit a three-run homer in the bottom of the first, and junior center fielder Daniel Taborelli followed that with a solo jack of his own to lead off the third.

USF’s real damage, though, came in the form of a seven-run barrage in the fifth inning. Senior first baseman Matt McHargue launched a three-run homer to get it started. By the time Georgetown starter Warren Sizemore departed, he was charged with 12 hits and 11 earned runs.

McHargue had one more blast in him, a solo shot in the sixth. It would be the last run for either team in the 14-3 game. The final followed a bad pattern that Georgetown has established this season: Every time the Hoyas give up more than eight runs – which has happened 18 times this season – they lose.

Though the outcome of the first game was a tough pill for Georgetown to swallow, the Hoyas battled back on Saturday and Sunday thanks to solid performances from their two starting pitchers, senior Stephen Burns and freshman Darren Sizemore.

“[Burns] pitched extremely well on Saturday, when we needed it most,” Wilk said. “He’s gone out there and won some big games for us in his senior year.”

Sizemore gave up only three hits in his outstanding complete game shut out, earning him the Big East player of the week award – the first of his career. Only one other Hoya has received the nomination this season, and that was his older brother Warren, for the week of April 17.

“I was able to command two of my pitches early in the game . so later in the game I was able to use my pitches that they hadn’t seen,” Darren Sizemore said. “Really, it was just getting ahead in the count, getting ahead on hitters and making pitchers’ pitches. .

“It felt good to get a win for my team in a big situation like that.”

Sophomore utility Matthew Bouchard delivered clutch hits for the Hoyas in those games. On Saturday, Georgetown was down 3-2 when Bouchard knocked a two-run single in the seventh inning to put the Hoyas up for good, 4-2.

Bouchard went 6-for-12 on the weekend, including two doubles in Sunday’s 2-0 victory.

The USF pitching staff was, despite the losses, solid overall. The starters especially made a statement with their high strike out tallies: eight for junior Casey Hudspeth, seven for sophomore Daniel Thomas and six for Davis Bilardello, in chronological order.

“The pitcher on Friday [Hudspeth] is supposed to be one of the best in the conference, and I agree with that,” Wilk said. “I thought he was very good.”

The statistics would agree, too: Hudspeth leads the Big East with 82 Ks on the season.

But Wilk added that, in general, “We’re striking out too much; that’s no secret.”

Georgetown plays its last non-conference game on Tuesday, facing UMBC at 7 p.m. in Baltimore. West Virginia (29-15, 9-9) comes to Shirley Povich Field this weekend, followed by Rutgers (20-20, 8-10) the next. The Hoyas wrap up the regular season against the Panthers (17-21, 6-12) in Pittsburgh on graduation weekend.

If the Hoyas can pull out wins in each of these series, they will have a very realistic chance of making the playoffs for the first time since 1986.

“At the beginning of the year, if you told me we would be very much in the playoff race . I would be shocked,” Wilk said. “In that way, I think we’ve done a nice job so far.”

But at the same time, Wilk immediately recognizes what makes this team different from all the others that he has coached in his seven years here.

“What I’m very proud of is that they . just want to win,” Wilk said. “They don’t really care who gets the accolades or who gets what. If we win at the end of the day, that’s the only thing that matters.”