OMAHA, Neb. — The Gators seek to extend their stay in the driver's seat at the College World Series on Wednesday afternoon.
The No. 2 seed Gators can clinch a berth in the best-of-three championship series with a victory over Texas Christian at Charles Schwab Field. If Florida loses, the teams will meet again on Thursday, with the winner advancing to the championship series.
TCU lost its opening game in the CWS to Oral Roberts but rebounded with elimination-game victories over Virginia on Sunday and a rematch against Oral Roberts on Tuesday. The Horned Frogs are playing their best baseball in the postseason, winning 11 of 12. Their only loss was a 6-5 defeat to Oral Roberts that they avenged Tuesday with a 6-1 win over the Golden Eagles.
Meanwhile, the Gators practiced on back-to-back off days and return to action following their 5-4 win over Oral Roberts on Sunday. The Gators have hit six home runs and scored 11 runs in their two victories.
The message from head coach Kevin O'Sullivan during the break was clear.
"We've got to keep our edge,'' O'Sullivan said. "We haven't done it yet. Sure, we're one game away from the finals, but we've still got to play one more game. They've just got to stay the course."
For a closer look at the Gators-Horned Frogs matchup, here is our CWS Primer:
***** FLORIDA
Record: 52-15 Regular Season: 42-13 (Co-SEC champions) Record vs. CWS Field: 4-1 (2-1 vs. Tennessee, 1-0 vs. Virginia, 1-0 vs. Oral Roberts) Coach:Kevin O'Sullivan, 16th year (679-317, .681) All-Time CWS Record: 23-24 CWS Appearances: 13 (1988, '91, '96, '98, 2005, '10, '11, '12, '15, '16, '17, '18, '23) CWS Titles: 1 (2017) Road to Omaha: Gainesville Regional — W vs. Florida A&M 3-0; L vs. Texas Tech 5-4; W vs. Connecticut 8-2; W vs. Texas Tech 7-1; W vs. Texas Tech 6-0. NCAAGainesville Super Regional — W vs. South Carolina, 5-4; W vs. South Carolina 4-0. College World Series — W vs. Virginia 6-5; W vs. Oral Roberts 5-4.
Gators fans wait for autographs in Omaha following Sunday night's win over Oral Roberts. (Photo: Maddie Washburn/UAA Communications)
NOTEWORTHY: The Gators have won seven consecutive games since a loss to Texas Tech in the Gainesville Regional, their second-longest streak of the season behind a nine-game winning streak in March ... Right-hander Hurston Waldrep struck out 12 in Sunday's win and now has 154 on the season. He trails only Alex Faedo (157 in 2017) on the school's single-season list ... Freshman 2B Cade Kurland is in a 1-for-15 slump but broke an 0-for-10 skid with a leadoff single in the first inning against Oral Roberts ... Florida's starting pitching has been superb in the NCAA Tournament. UF has won eight of nine games and the starters have pitched 57 1/3 innings with a collective 1.88 ERA (45 H, 12 ER, 18 BB, 73 SO) ... Sophomore left-hander Jac Caglianone will make his first CWS start on Wednesday. Caglianone is 7-3 with a 3.78 ERA and pitched six shutout innings in his last start, a 3-0 victory over Florida A&M in the first game of the Gainesville Regional on June 2 ... The Gators (23-24) can improve to .500 all time in the CWS with a victory today ... Florida is 14-13 all-time under O'Sullivan in Omaha ... The Gators became the first team since Stanford in 1987 to win a game at the CWS with five or less hits while their opponent had 10 or more. In Sunday's 5-4 win over Oral Roberts, UF had five hits, Oral Roberts finished with 11 ... OF Ty Evans has two home runs in the CWS, becoming the first UF player with multiple homers at the CWS since Pete Alonso and Harrison Bader in 2015 ... The Gators improved to 24-2 in games in which they hit three or more homers such as Sunday's win when Evans, SS Josh Rivera and DH Luke Heyman went deep ... The Gators are the first team to hit three home runs multiple times in a single CWS since the event moved to Charles Schwab Field in 2011.
QUOTE OF NOTE: "You would like at some point maybe, get couple guys on, hit a three-run homer. But certainly our team is built different this year than maybe it was some other years. We've been fortunate, to where the wind on Friday night, the last three innings, it died down and [Sunday] the wind was in our favor as well." — Gators coach Kevin O'Sullivan on his team's prowess to hit the long ball
*****
TCU
a vic Record: 43-23 Regular Season: 32-22 (13-11 in Big 12) Record vs. CWS Field: 2-1 (1-1 vs. Oral Roberts, 1-0 vs. Virginia) Coach: Kirk Saarloos, 2nd year (82-45, .646) All-Time CWS Record: 13-11 CWS Appearances: 6 (2010, '14, '15, '16, '17, '23) CWS Titles: 0 Road to Omaha: FayettevilleRegional — W vs. Arizona 12-4; W vs. Arkansas 20-5; W vs. Arkansas 12-4. NCAA Fort Worth Super Regional — W vs. Indiana State 4-1; W vs. Indiana State 6-4. College World Series — L vs. Oral Roberts 6-5; W vs. Virginia 4-3; W vs. Oral Roberts 6-1.
Former major league pitcher Kirk Saarloos has his TCU team in the College World Series in his second season as head coach. (Photo: John Rieger-USA TODAY Sports)
NOTEWORTHY: The Horned Frogs are back in the CWS for the first time since 2017, when they faced the eventual national champion Gators three times ... Right-hander Kole Klecker is the probable starter for the Horned Frogs. Klecker is 10-4 with a 3.73 ERA with seven quality starts over 91 2/3 IP ... TCU is 21-3 since the start of May and upset No. 3 national seed Arkansas in the regional ... TCU has a school-record 141 stolen bases and four players with 20 or more swipes, led by 2B Tre Richardson's 25. Richardson made headlines with his bat in TCU's 20-5 win over Arkansas in the regional, hitting three home runs (two of them grand slams) and driving in 11 in the runaway victory ... Saarloos replaced former coach Jim Schlossnagle when the latter took over at Texas A&M before the 2022 season ... The 44-year-old Saarloos spent seven years in the majors as a player from 2002-08, pitching for the Astros, A's and Reds ... 3B Brayden Taylor leads TCU with a school-record-tying 23 home runs and 69 RBI. He has reached bases safely in 33 consecutive games ... TCU heated up in time for the Big 12 Tournament, winning the title by going 4-0 with a pair of wins over Kansas State, and one each against Kansas and Oklahoma State ... 1B Cole Fontenelle leads the team with a .355 average and has an eight-game RBI streak. Fontenelle has hit safely in 39 of the last 46 games ... Saarloos is the first coach to lead his team to the CWS within two years of becoming a Division I head coach since Tim Tadlock guided his Texas Tech team to Omaha in 2014 ... OF Austin Davis has been productive in the postseason, driving in 17 runs over the last 12 games.
QUOTE OF NOTE: "I think they got consistent at being consistent. And I think that's the great thing, is being able to see that from a ballclub that has had stretches where it wasn't very consistent. So that's the neat thing about coaching 18- to 22-year-old kids, is it's fun when they all grab hold of it together and don't want it to end." — TCU coach Kirk Saarloos on his club's postseason run following Tuesday's win over Oral Roberts
