The Florida baseball team needed to pick up a win on Sunday afternoon to take the series against Tennessee and to improve the teams odds of making the NCAA tournament.
However, the Gators were unable to get it done.
Florida blew a 4-1 lead in the seventh inning, surrendering five runs in the frame to Tennessee and eventually falling 5-4.
“With three seniors on this team, and going out like that here, it’s embarrassing,” junior outfielder Austin Langworthy said.
Florida squandered leads in all three games against Tennessee, dropping the Gators to 30-23 overall and 13-17 in SEC play. The 2019 season marks the worst conference record under Kevin O’Sullivan, with the previous worst being 2013 when the team went 14-16 in the conference.
“We’re in a difficult position, we’ve never really been in this position before,” O’Sullivan said. “It’s kind of the same thing, we gave up the big inning, we gave up four runs, we ran into some deep counts again, we’ve got to do a better job of throwing two of the first three pitches for strikes like we always preach.”
Both starting pitchers started the game off strong. Pogue retired the Tennessee side in the top of the first. Tennessee starter Zach Linginfelter matched Pogue, retiring the Gators in order in the bottom half of the frame.
The Vols put a crooked number on the scoreboard first in the second inning. Evan Russell took a 2-2 pitch from Pogue with one out for a ride to left field that cleared the bleachers. That made it 1-0 Tennessee, giving the Vols their third 1-0 lead of the weekend.
However, Pogue regained his rhythm after allowing the home run. The Gator starter retired 12 of the next 13 batters he faced, including putting Tennessee down in order in the fourth and fifth innings.
“He did everything we could have asked from him,” O’Sullivan said.” I think he had six outs on one or two pitches, he engaged the defense and I was really pleased with how he threw the ball today.
The Gators tied the game up in the bottom of the third inning, despite not recording a base hit in the frame.
Jud Fabian was hit by a pitch and eventually got to third after he stole second and advanced on a wild pitch, putting him 90 feet from scoring.
Florida evened the game at 1-1 a batter later, when Brady McConnell grounded out to third, allowing Fabian enough time to get to the plate and score.
The Gators and Vols traded goose eggs in the fourth inning before Florida claimed the lead in the fifth.
Jacob Young jump started the offense, hitting a 1-out bloop single into right field. He then stole second, putting him in scoring position for Fabian. Young took off for third while Fabian ripped a ground ball into left field-that allowed Young to round third and easily score to give the Gators a 2-1 lead.
McConnell then came back to the plate, and continued to do what he’s done all weekend: drive in runs. This time, the Gators shortstop hit a towering moonshot to left field that cleared everything. It was McConnell’s third home run of the weekend and 15th of the season.
That broke the Gators single season record for home runs hit by a shortstop in a single season, passing Mark Ellis’s mark of 14 in 1998.
It was also McConnell’s 45th RBI of the season, which now leads the team, and his fifth of the weekend.
He finished the weekend going 6-14, including four extra base hits.
Austin Langworthy provided another run a batter later, clobbering a solo-home run of his own that went of his picture on the right field scoreboard to make it 4-1 Gators. That gave Langworthy his seventh homer of the season.
After Pogue recorded an out in the sixth inning, the Gators starter allowed his first walk of the game to Justin Ammons. Nolan Crisp was then brought in to take over on the mound.
Pogue finished the game going 5.1 innings and threw 75 pitches. The freshman allowed only one run on one hit while striking out two and walking only one batter.
“I just tried to stay within myself, didn’t really feel too much differently than my previous start against USF,” Pogue said. “I thought I threw really well, i was able to work off my fastball command and get my secondary.”
For the week, Pogue finished with 10.1 innings, allowing just a run and three hits in two starts.
Crisp was able to work out of a runners on second and third jam to retain the Gators lead in the sixth, but the same could not be said in the seventh inning.
In both Friday and Saturday’s games, Tennessee used a multi-run inning to take the lead from the Gators at some point in each game. The seventh inning was that for the Vols Sunday.
It got started when Crisp allowed a single to Jake Rucker and walked Pete Derkay. Ricky Martinez then tied the ball game up, hitting his first home run of the season to make it 4-4.
The Vols took the lead after Christian Scott entered to relieve Crisp, when Jay Charleston was able to bring home Connor Pavolony on a ground out to second to make it 5-4.
Florida was mere feet away from tying or taking the lead in the eighth inning. Both McConnell and Langworthy hit deep fly-balls to right center field warning tracks that only needed a few more feet to get out of the ballpark.
The Gators finished with six hits in the game, well off the 12 hit night on Saturday and the 14 hit performance on Friday night.
Florida will travel to Missouri next weekend to wrap up the regular season and attempt to clinch a spot in the SEC tournament in Hoover, Alabama.
Currently, the Gators sit at 11th in the conference with the top-12 teams making the tournament.
“We’ve had to lean on some younger arms this year and that goes back to the older guys,” O’Sullivan said. “If you look at years past, I think Brady Singer had a nine ERA his freshman year, I think Jackson Kowar only threw five innings his freshman year, but older guys kind of picked them up and we had a chance to groom those younger pitchers. We’ve had some older guys not really give us the opportunity to kind of bring these guys along a little bit slower.”
