Friday Roundup: Shore Leads Florida Over Miami

Three key story lines from around college baseball Friday night.

Strike One: Shore Shuts Down Hurricanes

It’s saying something when Florida coach Kevin O’Sullivan says Logan Shore’s outing against Miami on Friday “might be the best game he’s thrown at Florida.” There are certainly plenty of candidates, but Shore did something on Friday even he hadn’t done in a Gator uniform before—throw a complete-game shutout. That he did it on the road against a sixth-ranked Miami team with a loaded lineup of its own makes it even louder.

You can see highlights here.

Shore faced serious trouble only once, when he gave up a single and a double to begin the bottom of the fourth. A pickoff and two popups got him out of the jam. He finished the game with eight strikeouts and facing just two batters over the minimum, doing it on a cooly efficient 97 pitches.

HOW THE TOP 25 FARED

(1) Florida: won, 5-0, at (6) Miami

(2) Louisville: lost, 6-5, at (21) Mississippi

(3) Texas A&M: lost, 7-5, at Pepperdine

(4) Virginia: lost, 8-5 (10 inn.), vs. East Carolina

(5) Oregon State: won, 14-0, vs. Kansas State at Surprise, Ariz.

(6) Miami: lost, 5-0, vs. (1) Florida

(7) Vanderbilt: won, 9-0, vs. Illinois-Chicago

(8) Louisiana State: won, 6-0, vs. Sacramento State

(9) Houston: lost, 3-2, vs. Texas Tech at Shriners College Classic, Houston

(10) Louisiana-Lafayette: lost, 7-1, vs. (17) Texas Christian at Shriners College Classic, Houston

(11) California: won, 10-0, vs. Purdue

(12) Oregon: won, 4-2, vs. Illinois State

(13) Oklahoma State: lost, 2-1, at (20) North Carolina

(14) Michigan: won, 5-1, vs. St. Joseph’s at Jack Gifford Memorial Tournament, Santa Clara, Calif.

(15) UCLA: won, 7-6, at Cal Poly

(16) Florida State: lost, 2-1, vs. College of Charleston

(17) Texas Christian: won, 7-1, vs. (10) Louisiana-Lafayette at Shriners College Classic, Houston

(18) North Carolina State: lost, 10-8, vs. Wright State

(19) Coastal Carolina: won, 9-3, vs. Marshall at Baseball at the Beach Tournament, Conway, S.C.

(20) North Carolina: won, 2-1, vs. (13) Oklahoma State

(21) Mississippi: won, 6-5, vs. (2) Louisville

(22) Kentucky: lost, 11-4, vs. UC Santa Barbara at Tony Gwynn Classic, San Diego

(23) Georgia Tech: won, 4-1, vs. Maryland-Baltimore County

(24) Mississippi State: won, 4-2, vs. UMass-Lowell at Mississippi State Tournament, Starkville, Miss.

(25) Oklahoma: lost, 4-3, at Sam Houston State

“Once he got through the first inning, he was really good and had all three pitches working,” O’Sullivan told floridagators.com. “He was down in the strike zone and I have to say that he has been working hard in the bullpen about getting the ball down . . . His changeup was really good. He threw some really quality sliders and pitched to both sides of the plate with his fastball. If there was a game ball we give out, Logan gets it.”

Florida led from wire to wire, getting on the board in the top of the first on Peter Alonso’s two-run homer off Thomas Woodrey and going on to win by a 5-0 final. It was Florida’s 22nd win in the last 27 meetings with Miami, and life won’t get any easier for the Hurricanes on Saturday as they have to deal with possible No. 1 overall pick A.J. Puk on the mound.

Strike Two: Gauchos Jump On Brown, Wildcats

While the one-two punch of Dillon Tate and Justin Jacome paved the way to UC Santa Barbara’s earning a No. 1 regional seed last year, the success of this year’s Gauchos will be much more predicated on offense. So far, so good.

The Gauchos opened the Tony Gwynn Classic in San Diego with an 11-4 thrashing of No. 22 Kentucky. Coach Andrew Checketts expected to be able to roll out a more physical lineup this spring, and the Gauchos punished the ball on Friday, rapping out 14 hits in all and six for extra bases. They jumped on a struggling Zack Brown (4.1 IP, 5 H, 6 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 4 SO) to open up an 8-0 lead after five innings, led by a 3-for-5 night from DH Austin Bush that included a two-run homer in the top of the seventh.

“Our guys had a good approach all game,” Checketts told ucsbgauchos.com. “They were on time with their swings and squared up a lot of fastballs in hitter’s counts.”

UCSB is admittedly not as deep on the mound as it was, but they still have a quality Friday night arm in Shane Bieber. The junior righthander was his typical consistent self against Kentucky (6.1 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 5 SO), holding the Wildcats scoreless until the seventh before running out of steam.

Elsewhere at the Gwynn, Tulane outslugged Arizona 11-10 in a game that featured seven lead changes. Second baseman Jake Willsey hit two home runs for the Green Wave, including the game-winner in the bottom of the eighth off Wildcats two-way star Bobby Dalbec. The Wave will face tourney co-host San Diego in a semifinal after the Toreros thumped Nebraska 17-5, led by a 4-for-6 day from Bryson Brigman. San Diego State continued its sputtering start with a 10-2 loss to Bryant, dropping the Aztecs to 1-5 and setting up an unexpected UCSB-Bryant semifinal.

Strike Three: Cougars Stymie Seminoles

College of Charleston and first-year head coach Matt Heath already took a series from one brand-name opponent, Nebraska, on opening weekend, but they’ve jumped in the deep end in week two with a trip to No. 16 Florida State, a program that seldom loses series at home. The Cougars were 1-11 all-time against FSU and were returning to the place where their 2015 season ended with a pair of losses to the Seminoles in last year’s Tallahassee Regional. But, that was last year.

The 2016 version of the Cougars went into Dick Howser Stadium and walked out with a 2-1 win on Friday, as righthander Nathan Helvey (5.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 3 SO) and three relievers combined to limit the Seminoles, a team that scored 50 runs on opening weekend, to just three base hits. Helvey took a no-hitter into the fifth and hasn’t allowed a run in 11 1/3 innings to start the year. Charleston’s offense scratched out single runs in the fourth and sixth against Mike Compton (5.2 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 6 SO), while FSU got one in the eighth to pull within a run, but could get no closer. FSU hitters finished the night 1-for-12 with runners on base.

“It was a game in which their guy pitched very well and our guy pitched very well,” FSU head coach Mike Martin told seminoles.com. “They got a couple of key hits to drive in runs and while we hit the ball very hard, they positioned people very well.”

Granted, Florida State these days rolls out an extensively remodeled lineup from the D.J. Stewart-led crew that knocked out Charleston last year. Despite that, it’d still be a significant coup for the Cougars and their league, the Colonial Athletic Association, if they could pull out one more win over the next two days, and they’ll have the the talented Bailey Ober on the mound Saturday.

Charleston and UNC Wilmington figured to be the CAA’s top contenders, and both have shown well in the early going. The CAA already made some waves opening weekend when Northeastern split a four-game set at Oklahoma, all results that bode well for the CAA’s being a multi-bid league again, as has been in two of the last three years.

The Lineup

Nine newsmakers from Friday’s action.

1. Mike Shawaryn, rhp, Maryland: The Terps’ ace bounced back from a rare loss on opening weekend with a masterpiece (8 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 SO) against Rhode Island, retiring 22 of 24 hitters faced and with a first-inning single the lone hit he allowed.

2. Zac Gallen, rhp, North Carolina: Gallen dominated a ranked team for the second straight weekend, manhandling Oklahoma State (7 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 9 SO) in a 2-1 Tar Heels win, much as he did UCLA on Opening Day.

3. Evan Dougherty, cf, Duke: The sophomore had never homered in a college game until Friday, when he went out and belted three of them as Duke continued its strong start with an 8-1 thumping of Ohio State in Myrtle Beach, S.C.

“I was just looking for good pitches to hit and put good swings on it,” Dougherty told goduke.com. “With the wind, it’s real tempting to get the ball up, but I was just trying to hit line drives instead. Just happened to back spin balls and get them out of here.”

4. Jordan Sheffield, rhp, Vanderbilt: There were opposing coaches who felt Sheffield might’ve been the most talented pitcher on Vanderbilt’s roster last year, and outings such as Friday’s against Illinois-Chicago (7 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 11 SO) show why, as the redshirt sophomore set career highs for innings and strikeouts.

5. Wyatt Short, lhp, Mississippi: The Nos. 2, 3 and 4 teams all lost on Friday, beginning with Ole Miss’ 6-5 takedown of second-ranked Louisville in Oxford. Louisville had narrowed what was a 6-1 Rebels lead to 6-5 in the eighth, when junior closer Short came on, stranded the tying run in scoring position and went on to pick up a five-out save, the 15th of his career.

6. Brady Lloyd, 2b, East Carolina: Lloyd’s RBI double in the top of the 10th inning keyed ECU’s three-run rally as the Pirates pulled off an 8-5 upset win on the road at No. 4 Virginia. The always hard-nosed Pirates had already come from behind to tie the game in the ninth, and the win moves them to 5-0 on the year.

7. Clarke Schmidt, rhp, South Carolina: Stepping into the Friday night role as a sophomore, Schmidt looked every bit the part in his second outing of the year with a dominant night (7 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 8 SO) against Penn State.

8. Manny Jefferson, ss, Pepperdine: Jefferson hit a go-ahead, two-run homer in the bottom of the sixth as the Waves upset No. 3 Texas A&M 7-5, snapping the Aggies’ 35-game winning streak in regular-season non-conference games.

9. Luke Gillingham, lhp, Navy: The Midshipmen won the opener of their annual rivalry series against Air Force in Kinston, N.C., 3-1, behind a vintage performance from the senior Gillingham (7 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 13 SO), who got the best of a pitchers’ duel with the Falcons’ Griffin Jax (7 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 4 SO).