Florida Loses Season Series to Jacksonville
No. 21 Florida couldn’t protect home plate Tuesday when it fell to Jacksonville for the second time at Condron Family Ballpark in two weeks.
This time it was a 7-5 loss after falling 4-3 on March 31. It marks the first time in the 176-game history of the series that Jacksonville has defeated Florida twice on the road in the same season. Jacksonville improves to 4-3 in its last seven meetings with Florida with its 19th all-time win in Gainesville.
The game started strong for Florida (28-14) with a quick three-and-out and a homer from Kyle Jones in the first inning. Karson Bowen singled while Blake Cyr advanced to second and Brendan Lawson scored.
Things continued to get worse for Jacksonville (22-18), a fumbled ball with the bases loaded led to Cyr to score for a 3-0 UF lead.
However, that command began to fade in the third inning when Jacksonville had runners on first and third bases. Blake Edmonds scored a run for Jacksonville after Roger Vergara flew out to center field.
The struggles continued for Florida’s defense in the third when Derek Bermudez doubled down which led to a Sammy Mummau score. Jacksonville tied the game from a Bermudez score. After the third inning, the score was 3-3.
Starting pitcher for Florida Cooper Walls had a short outing. He was relieved after the third inning and had allowed four hits and struck out three. Walls threw 50 pitches and 33 were strikes.
Pitching for the Gators entering the fourth was Caden McDonald (L, 3-1).
Jacksonville took a 5-3 lead in the seventh inning. Mummau had an RBI. Then, with the Gators down 4-3, Eli Blair came in to pitch, but gave up another run for a 5-3 JU lead.
Jacksonville’s Brodie Scott took over pitching duties in relieving starter Ben Baler-Livingston (W, 1-1). Baler-Livingston threw for 92 pitches and had 60 strikes.
Florida also made another pitching change. Ricky Reeth came in from the bullpen, making it its fourth pitcher of the night.
This didn’t change anything as mistake after mistake was made in the eighth inning that allowed Jacksonville to take a 7-3 lead.
“It was those innings that we didn’t score and we obviously made a couple of errors,” UF coach Kevin O’Sullivan said.
Florida cut into the deficit with two runs in the eighth. Cyr homered for the fourth-straight game to lead off the frame. Bowen followed with a double to left-center field and later scored on a sacrifice fly to right from Colton Schwarz to cut the JU lead to 7-5.
It went down to the ninth inning. Florida down by two and a chance to tie or win the game. But the Gators couldn’t make that a possibility and failed to get the job done.
“We know we are a lot better than this,” Bowen said.
Florida is 17-11 against unranked teams, as opposed to 11-3 vs. ranked foes.
The Gators close the eight-game homestand this weekend against No. 7 Texas A&M. The series begins Friday at 6:30 p.m. on SEC Network+, 98.1-FM/850-AM WRUF.
Category: College Baseball, Feature Sports News, Gators Baseball
