No. 1 Baseball Welcomes Boston College For Weekend Series
Wednesday, February 23, 2011 | Baseball
After handling Florida Atlantic on Tuesday night in Jupiter, 13-2, No. 1 Florida (4-0) will welcome Atlantic Coast Conference foe Boston College (2-1) to McKethan Stadium. The Gators and Eagles will play Thursday and Friday at 5 p.m. and then wrap up the series on Sunday at 1 p.m. BC will be facing the Boston Red Sox in its annual exhibition on Saturday in Fort Myers.
Sophomore left-hander Brian Johnson (Cocoa Beach, Fla.) (1-0, 0.00) will start the series opener against Eagle junior right-hander Mike Dennhardt (0-0, 6.75). Johnson fired six scoreless innings and poked a pair of doubles last Friday against USF, facing the minimum of 18 batters. He yielded two singles, registered six strikeouts and retired the final 10 Bulls he encountered.
Sophomore right-hander Hudson Randall (Atlanta, Ga.) (1-0, 1.50) will start Friday's contest against a BC pitcher to be determined. Randall gave up one run on seven hits in six innings in his season debut last Saturday for the win and had six K without issuing any walks. Freshman Karsten Whitson (Chipley, Fla.) (1-0, 0.00) will go in Sunday's finale for the Gators, while Dennhardt has been announced as the Eagles' starter. Whitson totaled nine strikeouts, permitted one walk and allowed just a first-inning single over five scoreless frames last Sunday as UF completed the sweep of USF with a 5-0 shutout. The righty set down 11 batters in a row at one point, including five-straight by strikeout.
Thursday's first-ever meeting between the schools on the diamond will kick off a seven-game stretch for Florida against ACC schools. After this weekend, the Gators will meet Florida State in the first of four regular-season meetings next Tuesday in Tampa and then welcome Miami for three games beginning next Friday.
While UF will play its first 17 contests within the Sunshine State, including 14 on its own turf at McKethan Stadium, Boston College is in the midst of a 19-game swing away from Chestnut Hill. The Eagles are not scheduled to play at home until March 25, when Virginia Tech visits for a three-game set.
Encountering Florida Atlantic on Tuesday night at Roger Dean Stadium, the spring training home of the Florida Marlins and the St. Louis Cardinals, the Gators erupted for season-highs in hits and runs and used a strong outing from junior right-hander Anthony DeSclafani (Freehold, N.J.) to post a 13-2 victory over FAU (3-1).
Working on a pre-determined pitch count, DeSclafani (1-0) threw four shutout innings, allowing three hits and totaling three strikeouts, to earn his first win since March 15 of last season against Army. Juniors Preston Tucker (Tampa, Fla.) (4-for-5, two RBI) and Daniel Pigott (Ormond Beach, Fla.)(4-for-5, two RBI, two runs) each matched career highs with four hits as part of the Gators' 18-hit offensive outburst.
The Gators shot out of the gates with three unearned runs on three hits and two errors in the first inning, tacked on three runs in the third and two more in the fifth to build an 8-0 lead through five innings. The Owls ended UF's streak of 22.2 scoreless innings with a lead-off homer in the sixth, only to have the Orange and Blue respond with four more runs in the seventh for a 12-1 margin. Florida's six pitchers on the night gave up seven hits and a pair of runs, with eight strikeouts and zero walks. The offense accounted for 18 hits from nine different players and had a season-high five doubles.
Head coach Kevin O'Sullivan has used 13 different pitchers through four games and the group has registered a 1.25 earned run average, with 39 strikeouts, five runs and two walks in 36 innings. UF's starters are 4-0 with a 0.43 ERA after totaling 24 strikeouts and one walk in 21 innings, while its relievers have a 2.40 ERA, 15 K, one save and one walk in 15 innings.
Pigott opened the year by coming off the bench as a defensive replacement in the first meeting with USF. Since being inserted into the starting lineup over the past three games, he has gone 8-for-12 (.667) with five RBI, three hits and three doubles. Pigott has three-straight multiple-hit outings, most recently a 4-for-5, two-double, two-RBI, and two-run showing versus FAU. He had six multiple-hit games in 54 games last season.
Florida enters the series with BC having matched its school-record home winning streak of 18 games (March 16-May 13, 1963 & Feb. 10-March 31, 1998). UF's last loss at McKethan Stadium came on April 23, 2010, an 8-3 setback to No. 4 Arkansas in the opener of the weekend series. The Gators have captured their last 10 regular-season weekend series in Gainesville since falling two out of three to No. 16 Ole Miss from April 17-19, 2009.
Gator Bytes
*Florida is looking to start 5-0 for the fourth-straight season. O'Sullivan's 2008, 2009 and 2010 Gator teams each began 5-0 before losing its first game.
*For people making a big deal about the pitch clock, UF's three games have lasted 2:10, 2:16, 2:31 and 2:50, respectively.
*Senior Josh Adams (Jacksonville, Fla.) is the only member of the Gators to have a least one hit in all four games this season. UF's second baseman is batting .429 (6-for-14) with three runs, two sacrifices and one RBI.
*The Gators hold a 5-1 scoring advantage in the first inning and have yet to allow any runs from the second to fifth innings in building a 15-0 margin in that span.
*Florida is hitting .360 (27-for-75) against left-handers and .358 (24-for-67) against left-handers.
*Lead-off batters are 16-for-33 (.485) for the Gators, but just 5-for-36 (.139) for opponents.
*Gator pinch-hitters are 2-for-8 (.250) this year, as sophomore Cody Dent (Boynton Beach, Fla.) is 1-for-2 (.500) and junior Jeff Moyer (Winter Springs, Fla.) is 1-for-3 (.333).
*Moyer recorded his first hit at UF with a ground-rule double in the seventh inning on Tuesday against Florida Atlantic.
*Opposing hitters are 2-for-18 (.111) with runners in scoring position, while Florida is 19-for-61 (.311).
*Although the Gators have five stolen bases from five different players, foes have not tested the arm of sophomore catcher Mike Zunino (Cape Coral, Fla.) as of yet.
*Florida has totaled seven sacrifices, led by two sac flies by sophomore Austin Maddox (Jacksonville, Fla.) and two sac hits by Adams.
*Redshirt junior Paul Wilson (Lakeland, Fla.) certainly had an eventful debut as a Gator in the win over FAU. He entered the game in the seventh as a pinch runner for Tucker, moved to third on a passed ball and scored on an RBI single by Maddox. Making his first plate appearance in the ninth, Wilson was hit by a pitch, advanced to second on a wild pitch, took third on a fly-out by Maddox and scored on another errant pitch from the Owl pitcher.
*The Gators have roped 12 doubles, led by three apiece from Johnson and Pigott.
*Junior Tommy Toledo (Tampa, Fla.) struck out two of the three FAU batters he faced in the eighth on Tuesday and has scattered two hits over 3.1 innings.
*Maddox made his collegiate debut on the mound to close out the Owls and tallied two K, as well as fielding a bunt successfully.
*After notching a school-record .978 fielding percentage last year, the Gators have picked up right where they left off by committing just one error through their first four games for a .994 clip.
