Alex Faedo’s final season at Florida ended with a national championship, but it began with him taking his preparation to another level.

He was replacing Logan Shore, the 2016 SEC Pitcher of the Year, and wanted to do more film study on his opponents heading into 2017.

“I made a big deal out of doing a lot of video and scouting reports at the beginning of that year,” Faedo said.

He won his first four starts of the season and pitched a total of 21 ⅔ scoreless innings against Miami, Columbia and Seton Hall. Then came his first SEC game as Florida’s Friday night starter.

“We wanted to start off hot,” Faedo said, “but obviously we didn’t.”

Faedo fell apart on the mound in a 14-3 loss at Auburn. He gave up six runs on four hits with a career-high six walks. After the game, O’Sullivan said it was one of the rare times where Faedo didn’t have his command.

He had no one to blame but himself.

“I threw like crap,” Faedo said of the performance. “I thought I had my own game plan in my head, so against Auburn I actually shook Sully a lot. Every time he called a pitch I didn’t like, I shook him.

“We didn’t have too much leeway with that, but Sully did give it to me. That night I was trying to sink the ball a lot more than I usually do. And I didn’t pitch very well doing that.”

The Gators were swept by Auburn that weekend, making for a long bus ride home. O’Sullivan called out the players on the way back to Gainesville, Faedo in particular. Upon returning, the two of them discussed a better way to game plan together and communicate pitch calls.

“Sully challenged me a lot after that weekend, which was something I needed,” Faedo said. “Sully did a great job of how to pick and choose when to challenge me. He would do it verbally and just talk with me about how he expected more.

“He knew how good we could be and he expected a lot from me, but I let the team down that day. He let me know that. He also talked to me about shaking him off. We came up with more of a team game plan between me and him, and it worked well.”

Faedo bounced back the following week against LSU’s Alex Lange, his former teammate on Team USA, pitching six scoreless innings in Florida’s 1-0 win over the Tigers. Lange was the first of four first-round pitchers Faedo would face in 2017, and prior to the season he made a personal goal to beat them all.

“I got a lot of motivation from Auburn going into the LSU game that next weekend, especially playing against Alex and knowing how much the nation loves LSU,” Faedo said. “I set a big goal for myself before the year to beat Lange, Tanner Houck (Missouri), Kyle Wright (Vanderbilt) and Clarke Schmidt (South Carolina). They were big names and the same age as me, and I wanted to beat every one of them. LSU was first and it was coming off that loss, so that was a big game for me.”

The Gators won those four series and the SEC regular season championship, recovering from their 0-3 start. Faedo led UF back to the College World Series and put on a show in his third straight trip to Omaha.

In his two starts against TCU, Faedo combined for 14.1 scoreless innings and struck out 22 batters. He earned CWS Most Outstanding Player honors as Florida won the school’s first national championship.

“That’s like your ideal scenario whenever you finish anything. You want to finish as a winner and at the top, so that was huge to me,” Faedo said. “If we lost, I would have been so mad my family would’ve had to make me sign. I would have wanted to come back so bad. The teams we had going to Omaha that many times, we couldn’t not come out on top. So once we won a national championship, it made things easier and I was OK with leaving.”

Florida clinched the title with a 6-1 win over LSU. Faedo didn’t pitch against the Tigers in Omaha, but he helped freshman Tyler Dyson calm his nerves in his second career start.

“I remember Sully telling me, Brady (Singer) and Jackson (Kowar) to mess around with Dyson before the LSU game,” Faedo recalled. “I was like, ‘Are you sure?’ He was like, ‘Yeah, go do it.’ I had no idea why he wanted us to do that, but if Sully gives us free rein to mess around without getting in trouble and not have to hide it, I was all in. I would have been so pissed if he told someone to mess with me before my start, especially my freshman year.

“But Sully knew Dyson’s personality, so he was trying to keep his mind off the pressure of the game. So we messed with him in the locker room and played around. Next thing you know, it’s time for him to go get ready for the game to start. He didn’t even have to think about it. And then he went out and pitched the best game I’ve ever seen him throw in his life. So it ended up working. Sully definitely knew what he was doing there.”

Faedo set a school record and led the nation in 2017 with 157 strikeouts and finished his career with the highest win percentage in school history (.824). He was selected 18th overall by the Detroit Tigers in the 2017 MLB Draft and currently plays for the Erie SeaWolves, the club’s Double-A affiliate.

After striking out 134 batters in 22 starts last season, he’s looking forward to getting back on the mound once the sport resumes.

“I was watching the 2017 World Series the other day on SEC Network and I looked so fat. Now I’m in a lot better shape,” Faedo said. “Going into spring training I felt really good, just trying to build off last year. My arm felt really live. I gave up a couple runs against the Yankees, but I thought I threw the ball really well.

“I was real excited for what this year could bring to me, but obviously all this happened (with COVID-19). Now I’m just trying to stay ready to go. Hopefully we can get this season started soon because I definitely want to get back out there, keep learning and getting better.”