No. 4 Gator Baseball Completes Sweep Of Mizzou

Fourth-ranked Florida Gators baseball (35-10, 14-7) completes the sweep against the Missouri Tigers (24-19, 5-16) on Sunday at Condron Ballpark, winning 8-7. After losing all three games last weekend to South Carolina, Florida rebounds with three wins against the Tigers and have generated some positive momentum heading into next week.

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Gators get out in front early against the Tigers

Jac Caglianone threw up a zero in the first inning on the mound and added two strikeouts as well. Then, in the bottom of the first, the Gators took an early 1-0 lead over the Tigers. Wyatt Langford smacked a pitch over the left-center field wall for a home run to give the Gators the lead.

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Caglianone replicated his first inning with another zero and a pair of strikeouts against the Tigers in the second. It then got better for the Gators in the bottom of the inning. Back-to-back doubles from Luke Heyman and Colby Halter gave them one run. Tyler Shelnut followed that up with a sacrifice fly to deep center field to bring in Halter in from third base. These runs put the Gators up 3-0 heading into the third.

Cade Fisher limits the damage in the fourth

Jac Caglianone’s day ended on the mound in the fourth inning.  After a positive start to the day, Caglianone loaded the bases with no outs in the inning. This led to head coach Kevin O’Sullivan to bring in freshman lefty Cade Fisher out of the bullpen. Immediately after coming out of the bullpen, Florida turned a double play. However, the Tigers did get a run out of this to make it 3-1 heading into the bottom of the inning.

In the fifth, Caglianone added a run for the Gators with a solo homer to left-center field, his nation leading 25th of the year to push the Gator lead to 4-1. In the subsequent inning, Florida was handed a run on a wild pitch and a passed ball. This run made it 5-1 going into the seventh.

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Gators, Tigers trade runs in the seventh

Missouri started to claw their way back into the game in the seventh. Down four runs and with two on, a Tiger batter doubled to right field. This brought in both runners and cut the Gators four run lead in half.

However, the Gators responded with runs of their own in the bottom half. To lead off the bottom of the seventh, Cade Kurland hit a solo homer to center field.

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Following him, the next three batters got on to load the bases. From there, Florida added two runs on a sacrifice fly and a double. This put the Gators lead at 8-3 going into the eighth inning.

Nail-biter to end the game

Missouri entered the top of the eighth inning down five runs, but left only down one. It started with the Tigers loading the bases with zero outs. Then, they had back-to-back hits to score three runs. This resulted in O’Sullivan bringing in closer Brandon Neely. Neely worked the Gators out of the eighth inning before the Tigers had the chance to tie the game as they only got a sacrifice fly off of him. This put the score at 8-7 heading into the final inning.

Neely then closed the game for the Gators in the ninth. He struck out two of the three batters he faced, with the last of the three being a strikeout.

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Gator coach Kevin O’Sullivan talked about the win after the game.

And with this series in the books, the Gators edge closer to the end of the regular season. Wyatt Langford talked on what the team needs to continue to do as they make their way to the finish line.

Taking this momentum into next week

Florida will begin their week on Tuesday against the Florida State Seminoles to complete this year’s Sunshine State series. They will have a chance to sweep them as well on Tuesday and Caglianone talked on what it would mean for the program to do that.

Following this, they will travel to College Station on Friday to begin their weekend SEC series against the Texas A&M Aggies.