Florida & Virginia Set For Winner’s Bracket Matchup On Monday Night In Omaha
Sunday, June 14, 2015 | Baseball
Florida's College World Series Notes vs. Virginia
OMAHA, Neb. – After each squad posted victories on Saturday, No. 4 national seed Florida (50-16) and Virginia (40-22) will tangle at TD Ameritrade Park Omaha on Monday at 8 p.m. The winner of the game between the Gators and Cavaliers will improve to 2-0 at the NCAA College World Series and would be off until Friday afternoon, needing one win to advance to the best-of-three CWS Finals.
Sophomore left-hander A.J. Puk (9-3, 3.96) will be on the bump for the Gators and will face UVa junior left-hander Brandon Waddell (3-5, 4.15).
The game can be heard through GatorZone.com and on the Gator IMG Sports Network with Jeff Cardozo and Mick Hubert, it will be carried on ESPN2 with Kyle Peterson, Karl Ravech and Jessica Mendoza and can be viewed through the WatchESPN app. Live stats for each game will be available on GatorZone.com and fans can also follow updates of each game on @GatorZoneBB, the official Twitter account of the Gator baseball team.
QUICK HITS ABOUT THE GATORS
- Fueled by an 11-run, fourth-inning outburst, Florida extended its winning streak to 10 games with a 15-3 win over Miami.
- Saturday night marked the first meeting between the Sunshine State rivals in Omaha and the Gators have taken 20 of the last 25 encounters.
- Head coach Kevin O'Sullivan is 7-0 against the Hurricanes in the NCAA Tournament.
- The Gators have now reached the 50-win plateau for the fourth time in school history (1991, 1996, 2011, 2015). The single-season mark for wins is 53, set in 2011.
- Florida has tallied double-digits in runs in three straight outings – 13-5 and 11-4 over Florida State and 15-3 against Miami.
- Over their six NCAA Tournament wins, the Gators are batting .338 (75-for-222), have yielded 15 runs for a 2.17 earned run average, are fielding .986 (three errors) and have out-scored their opponents, 68-15.
- Sophomore left-hander A.J. Puk (9-3, 3.96) will make his first career start in Omaha and is 3-0 with a 1.83 ERA and has totaled 54 strikeouts in 34.1 innings over his last six starts.
- Freshman catcher/designated hitter JJ Schwarz (.335, 73 RBI) was chosen as the Most Valuable Player of the SEC Tournament after hitting .526 (10-for-19), with six RBI, five runs and three doubles and earned MVP of the NCAA Gainesville Regional with a .538 (7-for-13) clip. He was 5-for-7 (.714) against Florida State and is a sizzling 24-for-43 (.558) in 11 postseason games, with 19 RBI, 17 runs, five doubles and four homers.
- Senior third baseman Josh Tobias (.370, 44 RBI) has reached base in a team-high 28 consecutive games and has committed one error all year. He drove in three runs against UM and leads the Gators with 25 multiple-hit efforts.
- Junior righty Taylor Lewis (6-1, 1.24) earned SEC All-Tourney honors after eight shutout innings in Hoover, highlighted by a 4.1-inning stint versus top-ranked LSU in which he picked up the victory. Lewis has not allowed any runs in his last 11 appearances dating back to mid-April.
- Freshman right fielder Jeremy Vasquez is a scorching .563 (9-for-16) in six NCAA Tourney contests.
- Florida's bullpen is 22-3 with a 2.84 ERA and 14 saves, and has registered 232 strikeouts in 279.1 innings, with a .236 batting average against.
- UF is hitting .300 as team, has compiled a team earned run average of 3.20 and leads the nation with a .985 fielding percentage.
- Florida has played error-free baseball in 38 of its 66 games and is 31-7 (.816) in those games. The single-season school record for fielding percentage is .978, set in 2010.
- The Gators are 44-2 (.957) when out-hitting their opponent, 35-4 (.897) when scoring first, 31-5 (.861) when hitting a homer and 22-1 (.957) when scoring in the first inning.
- After 26 home runs in 63 outings last year, Florida has gone yard 60 times in 2015, led by Schwarz (18) and junior Harrison Bader (15).
SERIES NUGGETS
Florida has claimed four of its five meetings with Virginia but the teams have not squared off since the Gators swept a two-game series during the 1989 season at McKethan Stadium.
POSTSEASON MEETINGS VS. VIRGINIA
The Gators and Cavaliers split a pair of games during the 1985 NCAA Atlantic Regional in Coral Gables, Fla. UVa posted a 14-1 triumph on May 24, but UF rebounded for a 15-2 triumph in an elimination game three days later.
CONNECTIONS BETWEEN THE GATORS & CAVALIERS
Florida head coach Kevin O'Sullivan played two seasons at Virginia in 1990-91 and had a career batting average of .351. He was a first-team All-ACC and All-ACC Tourney recipient both years and earned a berth on the ACC Academic Honor Roll in 1990. Virginia assistant coach Karl Kuhn was a member of the Gators' 1990 club and earned his undergraduate degree from UF in 1992.
