The Florida baseball program recently landed one of the top 2023 right-handed pitchers in the country.

Countryside product and Sunshine State native, Liam Peterson, announced on Monday that he has verbally committed to the University of Florida.

Peterson is the seventh commit in UF's 2023 recruiting class. He is the second pitcher in the class but also the first right-hander.

On Perfect Game, Peterson is the nation's 255th-ranked prospect and 65th-ranked right-handed pitcher. He is also the 43rd-ranked prospect and seventh-ranked right-handed pitcher in Florida.

Being one of the top pitching prospects in the country, Peterson had a lot of schools interested, but only a handful had actually offered him.

“My offers were from the University of Miami, University of South Florida and University of Florida,” Peterson told GatorsTerritory. “The other schools I was in contact with were FSU, Arkansas, UCF, Wake Forest, NC State, Notre Dame and Louisville.”

Being from the Central Florida area, Peterson grew up watching the Gators and was very excited when he got the call from Florida’s assistant coach, Chuck Jeroloman.

“I’ve always liked the University of Florida since I was a little kid, so I was super excited when I got on my first call with coach Jeroloman,” Peterson told GT. “I knew that I wanted to be a part of the program, so when the offer came, I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to do.”

Peterson mostly spoke with Jeroloman and really liked his message and appreciated how honest he was.

“He [Chuck Jeroloman] said, ‘If you want to go to a school where people pat you on the back and tell you how good you are, then Florida is not for you,’” said Peterson. “I really liked this because it shows how competitive they are. They aren’t just going to hand things to you and I would love to be surrounded with people that work hard and earn what they get.”

When Peterson spoke with Florida’s head coach, Kevin O’Sullivan, he had some final questions answered and knew that Florida was the school he wanted to attend.

“He answered a few of the questions that I had on the academic side,” said Peterson. “The next time I called him was when I told him I wanted to be a Gator.”

With Peterson’s recruitment over, the high school sophomore is focused on his upcoming high school season and also trying to perfect his craft.

“I want to get in the weight room more so I can be at 95 by next summer,” Peterson said.

He also added that he was clocked at 90 mph in his last bullpen and topped out at 89 mph in his last outing in a Perfect Game event.

Stay tuned to GatorsTerritory.