No. 1 Florida tops No. 4 FSU 4-1 in Jacksonville

By Adam Silverstein
March 28, 2012

A three-run sixth inning led No. 1 Florida Gators baseball (23-2) to a 4-1 victory over the No. 4 Florida State Seminoles (21-4) in front of 10,751 fans on Tuesday night at The Baseball Grounds of Jacksonville in Jacksonville, FL. The win was Florida’s second against their in-state rival this season and clinched the three-game season series that is spread over 27 days in three separate locations.

The Gators defeated the Seminoles 9-2 on March 13 and will travel to Tallahassee, FL on April 10 to play the final game of the series.

Senior right-handed pitcher Greg Larson got the start for UF and began the contest on fire by allowing just one hit over his first three frames. However, Larson (3.2 IP, 3 H, ER, BB, 4 K) encountered some resistance in the top of the fourth as a lead-off double came around due to some solid base running and questionable fielding decisions. He was replaced by sophomore left-hander Daniel Gibson (1.2 IP, H, 2 BB, K), who got the final out of the inning to limit the damage.

Florida stranded pairs of runners on base in the fourth and fifth. Gibson struggled in the top of the sixth, giving up a leadoff walk and a single before throwing two passed balls and an intentional walk to load the bases. Freshman RHP Johnny Magliozzi entered the unenviable situation but was able to force a grounder that the Gators’ defense turned into a 5-4-3 double play to get out of the inning unscathed.

The momentum appeared to swing at that point as Florida capitalized in the bottom of the inning. With two on and two out, freshman second baseman Casey Turgeon (1/3, 2 RBI, R, BB) lofted a ball just over the center fielder’s head and legged it out into a triple to score both base runners. He reached home one batter later when junior left fielder Vickash Ramjit (2/4, 2 RBI) hit a sharp single to right to give the Gators a 4-1 lead.

Magliozzi (3-0, 0.2 IP) earned the victory as junior LHP Steven Rodriguez (2.0 IP, H, 2 K) and junior closer Austin Maddox (S8, 1.0 IP, 2 K) shut the door on FSU.

The victory marked UF’s first over Florida State in Jacksonville since 2007. It was also the first time the Gators had defeated the Seminoles in a regular season series since 2009. Turgeon and senior center fielder Daniel Pigott (1/4) each registered their first career triples in the contest.

Florida now has 13 come-from-behind victories in 2012 as well as a 10-2 record against ranked opponents (7-1 against top-10 teams).

The Gators are now halfway through their eight-game road trip and will pick it up on Friday for the beginning of a three-game series against Ole Miss in Oxford, MS.

8 Comments

  1. Ken (CA) says:

    great win! always awesome to beat FSU, sometimes those are hard to come by. Wasn’t Ramjit playing 1st base last year? I didn’t realize he had shifted positions..

  2. cline says:

    4-1 is a great ending considering how FSU’s starter looked prior to being yanked.

    I think Ramjit is a utility player, used mostly as DH. Gushue is going to be good if he sticks around. that snag he made at 1B was legit.

  3. Joe says:

    Glad to see Sully finally taking these midweek games seriously

  4. John S says:

    Great win, we needed to get the FSU dominance off our backs. Those double plays were clutch.

    Glad for Sully and our team.

  5. SC Gator says:

    7-1 vs top 10 teams

    Hold on, that bears repeating

    7-1 VS TOP 10 TEAMS!

    Holy hell that’s a good stat.

Join The
Discussion

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Top
WordPress Appliance - Powered by TurnKey Linux