Florida Gators strikeout in CWS Final rematch with LSU Tigers

A strong breeze whipped through the grounds at Alex Box Stadium. The Florida Gators‘ added to that, striking out a season-high 16 times on the way to a 6-1 series-opening loss against the defending National Champion LSU Tigers.

The Tigers (19-4, 2-2 SEC) put two runs on the Gators (12-9, 2-2 SEC) in the first inning. With two outs, Josh Pearson and Ethan Frey produced RBI singles through the left side to open a 2-0 LSU edge.
 
UF starter Cade Fisher rebounded in the second and third for back-to-back clean innings. Ty Evans then cut the deficit to one run in the top of the fourth, hitting an opposite-field shot over the right field wall to make it a 2-1 ballgame. LSU eventually broke through in the bottom of the sixth, beginning with a bases-loaded walk of Michael Braswell III. Paxton Kling then drove home Frey on a sacrifice fly to left while Bingham brought in Frey on an infield single to third base.
 
Faced with a 5-1 deficit, righty Fisher Jameson entered the game for the Gators in the seventh. The junior worked around a one-out single by Hayden Travinski to hold the score. LSU added an insurance run in the eighth inning to make the score 6-1.

Players of the Game

Ty Evans: Evans provided two of the Gators’ four hits and his solo home run in the fourth inning was the only run the Gators would score.

What went wrong

• The offense lost the plot. Florida came into the game with a gameplan to sit on the fastball. The Gators chased offspeed pitches early in counts and continued to swing at elevated fastballs. That resulted in fly balls (5) and strikeouts (16). The offense came in with an approach but didn’t follow it, resulting in their worst game of the season.
• Cade Fisher continues to have blowup innings. Fisher threw nearly 40 pitches in a two run top of the first. He settled in but lasted just five innings, allowing five earned runs. He walked two Tigers and hit two more while his ERA rose from 7.94 to 8.13. On the season, Fisher has allowed 33 hits, 25 runs (23 earned) over just 27.2 innings pitched in six games.

Notes:

• Friday night’s official attendance was a sell-out crowd of 12,539.
• Across his last five starts, Fisher has recorded 38 strikeouts against five walks.
• Evans hit his fifth home run in the fourth inning for Florida’s first hit.
  • Evans turned in his ninth multi-hit performance in Florida’s last 11 games.
• Heyman and Shelton had their 20-game on-base streaks snapped.
• Kurland saw his team-high nine-game hitting streak come to an end.
• The Gators are 40-15 in weekend series since 2023 and 49-18 across the team’s previous 23 series.
  • Florida is 39-18 in its last 57 games vs. SEC opponents including a 31-15 regular-season mark.
• Florida is now 53-69-1 all-time vs. LSU including 15-32-1 in Baton Rouge.
  • The Gators are 24-22 against the Tigers under head coach Kevin O’Sullivan (7-12 away).

Quotes:

From Florida Gators head coach Kevin O’Sullivan on radio

On the outcome of the game…
“We got off to a tough start on the mound to start the game, obviously. We threw 40 pitches in the first (inning). You look back at the innings that we give up runs and it usually involves a walk or two, a hit by pitch, that type of thing. We didn’t handle the first inning very well but we settled in and put up four zeros in a row. The sixth inning, went 3-2 on (Hayden) Travinski and he hit a double. Then a bunt situation and (Josh) Pearson is hit by a pitch. We fall behind (Ethan) Frey 2-0 and he’s trying to bunt. That kind of opens things up there.”

On the offensive struggles…
“Offensively, we didn’t stay with the plan. The idea was to take away his fastball and push it down. We kept chasing sliders and curveballs early and late in the count and chasing balls up in the zone and hit some balls in the air. We’re just going to have to do a better job with our approach tomorrow. All in all, we didn’t handle the environment really well either. It was kind of uncharacteristic. I think we struck out nine times in the first three innings. We just have to put it behind us and get ready to play tomorrow.”

On the environment at LSU…
“You could tell our swings were out of control and we didn’t stay with our approach. I mean we had a plan against (Luke) Holman. Stay off the breaking ball and let’s take his fastball away and push the fastball down. We did the exact opposite. We chased breaking balls early, w chased breaking balls late and swung through some up fastballs or hit the ball in the air. You know, I think that’s the frustrating part because we did have a plan but we obviously didn’t stay with it.”

What’s next for the Florida Gators

Florida and LSU will be back on the diamond on Saturday night at 7:00 pm ET. Florida will send freshman RHP Liam Peterson (1-2, 7.50 ERA) to the mound against sophomore LHP Gage Jump (2-0, 2.12 ERA).