No. 14 Gators Drop Game One at No. 22 Miami

CORAL GABLES, Fla. – In front of a sold-out crowd at Mark Light Field, No. 14 Florida’s attempt at a late-inning comeback came up short as No. 22 Miami took game one of the series by a score of 5-2.
 
The Gators (8-3) and Hurricanes (8-1) found themselves in a pitchers’ duel in the early going, as starting pitchers Hunter Barco and Carson Palmquist exchanged scoreless frames through the third inning. Miami eventually got to Barco in the fourth, when Yohandy Morales hit a two-run shot over the left field wall to put the Canes up, 2-0.
 
Miami added two more runs in the sixth. After singling and advancing to second on a sac bunt, Dominic Pitelli was running on an 0-2 pitch and came around to score on a groundout by CJ Klayfus. Morales then drove in Jacob Burke with a double down the left field line.
 
Right-handed reliever Blake Purnell relieved Barco in the sixth, tossing a scoreless inning and giving the Gators the opportunity to claw back into the game.
 
Trailing 4-0, the Florida bats woke up in the seventh. Deric Fabian and Colby Halter drew walks to open the inning, allowing Sterlin Thompson to drive in Fabian with an RBI single through the right side. Wyatt Langford followed that up with an RBI single of his own, finding a hole on the left side of the infield to plate Halter and cut the deficit to two runs.
 
The Canes answered against Purnell in the bottom of the seventh, as Pitelli crossed home for the second time of the night. With two outs, Burke brought in Pitelli with an RBI groundout to third base, extending the Miami advantage to 5-2.
 
Right-hander Karl Hartman churned out a shutout frame to hold the score for the Gators in the eighth, giving the Florida offense an opportunity to battle back in a save situation for Miami. Canes closer Andrew Walters ultimately nailed down the save, navigating around a one-out Thompson single to close the door. Walters finished with 2.1 shutout innings of relief with two hits allowed and three strikeouts.
 
Barco received his first loss of the season, pitching 5.0 innings and allowing four earned runs on seven hits. The southpaw struck out five batters, bringing his season total to 28 through 17.0 frames.
 
Miami starting pitcher Carson Palmquist earned the victory. The lefty fired 5.0 innings of shutout work, scattering three hits and three walks while striking out six.

NOTABLES

• Following tonight’s game, Florida is now 128-133-1 including 49-81 on the road vs. Miami.

  • The Gators are 35-16 against the Canes under head coach Kevin O’Sullivan.
  • Florida has won six of the last-nine meetings vs. Miami.
  • Florida last lost the series opener to Miami on Feb. 22, 2019 (L, 2-5) in Gainesville.

    • The Gators rallied to win that series, two games to one (W, 9-3 / W, 4-1).
    • The winner of game one between Florida and Miami has gone on to lose two of the last-three series.

• The Gators saw their seven-game winning streak snapped.
• Thompson and Halter extended their season-opening hitting streaks to 11 games.

  • Halter owns a 13-game hitting streak dating back to last season.

• Following tonight’s outing, Barco now has 28 strikeouts and just two walks in 17.0 innings, translating to 14.8 strikeouts per nine innings and a 14.0 strikeout-to-walk ratio.

 
FROM HEAD COACH KEVIN O’SULLIVAN
On Carson Palmquist’s performance and its impact on the game plan…
“I mean, that was the plan, to hopefully get his pitch count up and get him out after five and some change, and we did that. Feel like the entire night we were like one quality at bat away from either taking the lead or getting back into the ballgame. It just seemed like that. Credit their pitchers, they made big pitches when they needed to, but I think we left 12 guys on base. But I thought our approaches were good, you know, for the most part. The bottom line is we hurt ourselves. Morales’ two-run homer, those things happen. We got an 0-2 count with two outs with a runner on first, buried a pitch and he hits a triple down the left field line. That’s another run. Then, it’s kind of a weird play with a swinging bunt. Mac [Guscette] comes out, threw to first and we don’t cover home… Then, we made the error behind the plate, and then blocking balls in the dirt, the guy advances. They have a jam shot and another run, so that’s three runs. So, we just really didn’t help ourselves. Bottom line is, you know, we saw all their best arms tonight. It was [Gage] Ziehl, I think he threw over 30 pitches. And then they went to [Alex] McFarlane and then obviously brought their closer in in the seventh inning. You know, very rarely do they extend him that much. So, we’re still in good shape for the series. Last year, we won the Friday night game and lost the series. We’re fine. Just come out tomorrow and hopefully get a good start from Brandon [Sproat] and see what happens.”
 
On Yohandy Morales’ night at the plate for Miami…
“He’s good. He’s their best hitter. He’s good. You tip your cap. You know, the home run’s a home run. But then we got a guy in a 0-2 count and we just got to make one more pitch. That’s kind of the difference in the game. Their best hitter got some really good swings off tonight and that’s it. But other than that, I thought Barco threw good. The plan was, like I said, to hopefully get Palmquist out of the game after five and if you could do that, you give yourself a chance…”
 
On his message to the team…
“The bottom line is we went over the mistakes that we made that kind of hurt us. But the bottom line is tomorrow is another ballgame. I mean, if Brandon throws like he’s been throwing, I feel really good about tomorrow. But, I didn’t think we didn’t compete tonight, we just kind of hurt ourselves with a couple of mental mistakes. We got picked at first base with nothing on, and there was some things that we did that, you know, the first hitter of the game if that’s a hit-by-pitch, the next thing, who knows what happens. It is what it is. But they’ll be ready to play tomorrow.”

UP NEXT

Florida and Miami meet again on Saturday for game two, streaming on ACC Network Extra at 6 p.m.