FSU Baseball: The Gators Were Simply Better

The optimism that Florida State and its fans felt following a 2-hit shutout by pitcher Drew Carlton to open the Gainesville Super Regional on Saturday night subsided into a much less pleasurable feeling late Monday…reality.

For the second straight night and for the third time in six meetings this season, FSU was shut out by its arch-rival Florida. The Gators won 7-0 to not only win their seventh meeting in eight tries against the Seminoles, but to punch their ticket to Omaha for the College World Series.

For FSU during the Super Regional and throughout the season against Florida, squandered opportunities took precedent. On the season, the Seminoles were an unthinkable 2-for-52 with runners in scoring position against their rivals.

Florida State left runners in scoring position in each of the first three innings during the decisive game of the Super Regional, squandering a two on, none out situation in the first and a bases loaded situation in the third. The next time the Seminoles put a runner in scoring position on Monday night, they were down 7-0.

Ultimately for the Seminoles however, it wasn’t their inability to get runners home, their miscues in the field or a decision to have Jackson Lueck bunt with two on and none out in the first inning with Florida starter A.J. Puk struggling to find the strike zone that would cost FSU a trip to Omaha. Instead, it was this: Florida was just much better.

Of course, the miscues and missed opportunities hurt any chance FSU may have had to upset its rivals, but the Seminoles needed to play near perfect to win the Super Regional. Florida was far from perfect and still easily defeated Florida State over the final two games. The gap in experience and talent between the teams may not be Grand Canyon-esque, but it is significant.

To illustrate, Florida had seven players, including five pitchers selected in the first 108 picks of this year’s Major League Baseball Draft. FSU had just one player drafted. That was third baseball John Sansone, who didn’t go until the eighth round at No. 228 overall.

That’s not to say the Seminoles don’t have talent. They certainly do, but it’s just young talent. The draft picks they were facing during the Gainesville Super Regional were all very experienced juniors coming off a deep run into the College World Series.

No. 6 overall pick A.J. Puk was not close to sharp on Monday night in his 3 2/3 innings of work and the Seminoles still failed to get anything off of him. The night before, it was No. 47 overall pick Logan Shore who stifled FSU for eight innings.

For the first time this season, No. 3 and 4 hitters Jackson Lueck and Cal Raleigh were made to look like freshmen in Gainesville. Taylor Walls and John Sansone, who had set the table masterfully all season for Florida State, were a combined 4-for-22 during the Super Regional. First baseman Dylan Busby, who entered the Super Regional hitting .500 with six home runs in his previous seven games, was cooled off significantly. Busby managed hits in his first and last at-bat of the Super Regional with eight outs in between.

With what is arguably the best pitching staff in the country, the Gators held Florida State to just three total runs and 13 hits over the three games. In the six total match-ups between the teams this season, Florida State’s potent offense was held to just seven runs. Though Florida had its own troubles with runners in scoring position, the Gators managed to score 29 runs against the Seminoles this season. That’s an average of nearly four runs more per game than FSU in 2016.

For the fourth straight year, Florida State will be watching the College World Series from home. With a young team however, FSU won 40 games for the 39th straight year and actually won a Super Regional game against Florida this time around after being shellacked 13-4 and 11-5 last year. Still, when all was said and done, the better team won.

The good news is that Sansone will likely be Florida State’s only significant subtraction and odds are that he’ll be replaced by a very talented incoming freshman in Drew Mendoza. For those tired of FSU holding the distinction of appearing in the most College World Series’ without a title, take this with a grain of salt, but next season and 2018 each have the potential to be a great ones for the Seminoles.