Gators win a slugfest on the road in Jacksonville

JACKSONVILLE — This No. 6 Florida Gators baseball team won’t let you blink. If you do you could miss something towering into the night or a screaming line drive racing over the infield at 100-plus miles an hour. The Florida bats were back at it again Tuesday night scoring a season-high 18 runs on 17 hits to beat Jacksonville 18-8.

Florida hasn’t had any trouble hitting the baseball this season. The Gators ave scored double-digit runs in eight of nine games this season, only putting up a measly nine on Sunday of the opening weekend.

A whipping and whirling wing made playing defense precarious. Florida committed just one error but the Dolphins had a season-high seven.

Flroida took advanatge of those errors beginning in the second inning. Josh Rivera was hit by a pitch and advanced to third on an error that allowed Richie Schiekofer to reach base. Luke Heyman’s groundout would plate Rivera.

 
Florida and Jacksonville (5-4) exchanged zeros over the next three half innings before the Orange & Blue manufactured three more runs in the fourth. Schiekofer and Heyman reached on back-to-back singles, with the former scoring on a sacrifice bunt by Colby Halter. Heyman and Cade Kurland later came in on Jacksonville fielding errors, extending the UF lead to 4-0.

The launch pad was now ready. Florida would pound three homers courtesy of Langford, Caglianone, and Kurland’s first career grand slam.

Pitching shows up

Ryan Slater earned the start and got the win in a controlled start that lasted four innings. Slater needed only 45 pitches to get through four innings and gave up just one solo homerun.

“I thought Ryan Slater was outstanding,” Kevin O’Sullivan told Gators Online after the game. “Exactly what we needed. Kept his pitch count down, only gave up one run over the four and only threw 45 pitches.”

The biggest development of the night might have been Philip Abner getting his first innings since Opening Night.

Abner struck out the side in the eighth inning, his first inning of work. He allowed one hit in the ninth but struck out three more to close the game out.

Florida’s bullpen has been the lone weakness in the first nine games. However, with Florida’s front end pitching, they don’t ask a lot from the bullpen.

“We feel really good with (Brandon) Neely at the end. Our weekend starters are really good. They should be able to get us into the second half of games,” O’Sullivan told Gators Online. Really what we’re looking for is three to six outs. If our starters all go six, we need some help in the seventh and the eighth then hand it over to Neely in the ninth. We can also use Neely as a two inning closer.” 

Notes

• With the win, Florida improved to 2-0 on the road this season.
• The Gators set a season high in runs (18) while tying their season high in hits (17).
  • Florida last scored as many as 18 runs on May 3, 2022 vs. South Florida (18-3 win).
• Florida’s run differential of plus-69 is the team’s best through nine games since the 2003 season (plus-85).
• The Gators have scored in 47 of 72 batted innings this season (65.3%).
• For the eighth time in nine games this year, the Gators recorded double-digit hits.
  • Florida has posted nine or more hits in every game this season.
  • Tuesday represented Florida’s fourth game eclipsing 14 or more hits this year.
• The Gators have 119 hits through nine games (13.2 hits/game).
• Langford set a career high with four hits, finishing 4-for-5 with one home run, two RBI and two runs.
• Heyman notched three hits for the first time in his career.
• Making his fourth-career start, Slater earned the win by pitching four innings of one-run ball, allowing three hits and striking out four.
  • In two appearances vs. JU, Slater has pitched a total of nine innings with one earned run allowed.
• Kurland continued his torrid start at the plate, going 2-for-6 with one home run, one double, four runs and four RBI.
  • Kurland has registered at least two hits in all seven of his starts to begin his career.
  • Kurland’s four runs scored set a new career high.

Up next

The Gators return home Wednesday to host JU at 6:00 pm. The game will be streamed on SEC Network+.

The highly anticipated series with the No. 22 Miami Hurricanes will begin Friday at 6:30 p.m. The series continues on Saturday at 2:00 p.m. Both of those games will be streamed on SEC Network+. The Sunday finale will begin at noon and will be on linear television with SEC Network broadcasting the game live.

The Hurricanes fell to Florida Atlantic Univeristy 6-5 on Tuesday night.