Virginia falls 10-5 to Florida Baseball In CWS

Ben Murphy June 20, 2015 College Baseball 161 Views

After getting shut down by the Virginia Cavaliers on Monday, the Florida baseball team bounced back Friday afternoon in a strong way, beating Virginia 10-5 to set up an elimination game with the Cavaliers on Saturday.

Florida head coach Kevin O’Sullivan says his team is focused.

“Obviously we’re excited about the opportunity to play tomorrow. I was really concerned when I saw Kirby’s (Virginia pitcher) first couple of innings. He kept flipping changeups in there for strikes and his command looked really good. Our approach was to take a first-pitch strike and get his pitch count up because he was probably going to be on some kind of pitch count. But he kept throwing first-pitch strikes and looked really sharp. We hung in there, and like I said, we played good defense, we had some really good at-bats. Logan gave us a great start again.”

Florida’s Logan Shore entered the game having already won his first College World Series appearance back on Friday. Shore looked very comfortable on the mound pitching into the seventh inning. Shore allowed four runs to reach but did do enough early on to keep the Cavaliers out of Florida’s reach.

The Gators piled on runs in bunches like they have done all season. Two innings accounted for nine of Florida’s 10 runs Friday afternoon. UF shortstop Richie Martin was three for four with two RBI on the day. He talked about making the most of big innings.

“I just think that we’re coming together as a team at the right time throughout the season. We haven’t really put everything together as an offense, defense and pitching-wise. So it’s nice to get this going in the postseason when it matters.”

The Gators have scored double digit runs eight times since the start of the SEC Tournament. Florida will look to continue the momentum tonight at 8 ET against Virginia in a win or go home situation. The winner will face off against Vanderbilt for the national championship. Florida head coach Kevin O’Sullivan says he will start either Dane Dunning or A.J. Puk for todays game.

Catch the action on 103-7 the Gator.

Post game sound from Friday’s game against Virginia.

Florida head coach Kevin O’Sullivan