Gator Baseball Cliches Series with a Saturday Night Win Over Miami

Brady Singer was dominant Saturday night on the mound in leading the Florida Gator baseball team to a series-clinching 2-0 victory over the Miami Hurricanes in Gainesville. Singer kept the Canes’ hitters off-balance all night long. He struck out a career-high 11 over 7 2/3 scoreless innings while walking just one. Florida has now won 25 of their last 31 games against their in-state rivals, including seven of the last eight matchups between these two schools.

Gators on the Mound

For the first time in school history, Florida registered back-to-back shutouts against Miami after Saturday night’s win. Florida’s pitching staff held the Canes to just five hits and finished the game with 13 total strikeouts. Three of those strikeouts came from Singer’s sixth inning when he struck out the side.

Singer did an excellent job in keeping the Canes off the bases. In the few times that Miami did get on the bases, Florida’s defense was able to turn two double plays to finish out the fifth inning and then again to get the first two outs of the ninth.

After Singer struck out his 11th batter of the night in the top of the eighth, junior left-handed pitcher Nick Horvath came in as relief to face left-handed batter Johnny Ruiz.

Singer threw 108 pitches on the night. Seventy-six of those pitches were strikes. Singer received a well-deserved standing ovation from the standing-room-only crowd at McKethan Stadium. The fan base totaled 6,160 making it the second largest in the program’s history.

Frank Rubio would go on to close out the game after just five pitches and one strikeout.

Final out from McKethan tonight. @GatorsBB take the series against Miami. Singer: 7.2 IP, 0 R, 11 K. #Gators pic.twitter.com/L9qJRCGNsW

— Fernando Juncadella (@FJuncadella) February 26, 2017

At the Plate

After two scoreless innings from both teams, Florida designated hitter Mark Kolozsvary led off the bottom half of the third inning by hitting his first home run of the season over the left-field wall. Kolozsvary’s homer off of Miami’s starter Jeb Bargfeldt gave the momentum and the lead to the Gators. Bargfeldt finished the game pitching a total of six innings. He gave up two runs, struck out three, and threw a total of 89 pitches.

In the fifth inning, it looked like the Canes were going to get on the board. Junior left-fielder James Davison hit an infield single to reach base with one out. Davison then stole second and advanced to third on catcher Joe Gomez’s single. With runners on the corners, the Gators turned a 5-4-3 double play to finish the inning protecting their 1-0 lead.

Extending the Lead

Florida doubled their lead when Jonathan India hit a two-out solo home run. India hit his second homer of the year sailing the ball over the left-center field wall and padded the Gators lead to what would end up being the final score, 2-0.

India says he was happy he could contribute offensively for his team.

Miami came out in the seventh inning with another chance to get on the board. Third baseman Edgar Michelangeli reached on Singer’s only walk of the night and advanced to second when Romy Gonzalez grounded into a fielder’s choice. Gregory Veliz came in to pinch-hit for Christopher Barr and hit a deep fly out to center field that allowed Michelangeli to tag up and reach third. Michelangeli was stranded at third when Davison was thrown out at first to end the inning.

This would be the last inning that the Canes had runners in scoring position. Florida clinched the series with a 2-0 victory.

Game 3

The series finale is slated for 1 p.m. on Sunday at McKethan Stadium when Gators will look to sweep the series against the Hurricanes. You can catch coverage live here on ESPN 98.1 FM/850 AM WRUF.