Survive and advance.
Florida State Seminoles baseball took on Georgia Tech for its first game of pool play on Tuesday, with the loser being eliminated from playing this weekend.
It took a team effort, as Link Jarrett used eight pitchers, and the offense put up 12 runs for the Seminoles to hold off a resilient Georgia Tech squad. Earlier this season, FSU would have lost this contest, but the group's maturity to not let go of the rope shone through as they got to keep dreaming until Friday.
It did not take long for the Seminoles to get the scoring started. After a two-out walk from James Tibbs, Marco Dinges took the first of four two-run home runs to dead center and gave FSU an early 2-0. He rounded the bases with the same blank stare, setting the tone that the Seminoles meant business in Charlotte.
Conner Whittaker started the game for Florida State but only threw two innings as he works his way back from an injury. In back-to-back frames, a runner stood on second with two outs, but he dug in and did not allow a run. In the third, John Abraham came in for relief and instantly gave up a solo shot to cut the lead in half. The freshman allowed a walk to the ensuing batter but recorded two strikeouts with one out to end the threat. He came back out for the fourth and worked around an error from Lodise to strand a runner at third and keep the game at 2-1. The Florida State pitching staff kept GT hitting 0-5 with RISP to start the game.
The Seminoles made the first move to separate themselves in the bottom of the frame with a Daniel Cantu two-run blast. Jamie Ferrer stood on first after being hit by a pitch, as the 1B needed one swing to send the ball 389 feet out to right. Two batters later, Drew Faurot extended the advantage to five as he hit a towering two-run shot to bring home Alex Lodise. The first five batters of the inning reached base as the ‘Noles held a comfortable 6-1 lead. The offense goes as the home runs go, and their ability to hit the long ball continues to be their calling card.
In the middle frames, Joe Charles pitched two clean innings for FSU. Jamie Ferrer hit the fourth two-run HR in the bottom of the fifth, giving FSU an 8-1 lead as the 4-5-6 hitters smashed a long ball. In the sixth, on five pitches, he induced three straight ground balls to Cam Smith for back-to-back 1-2-3 innings as the Noles started to run away.
Then, the avalanche came.
Cam Smith did not field a challenging play at third and allowed the lead-off base runner to get on. Brennen Oxford came on for Joe Charles after he allowed three more base hits and two runs. The veteran lefty did not fare any better, giving up a double before recording the first out of the inning. Georgia Tech scored five in the seventh on seven hits, and it could have been worse if not for a bases-loaded inning-ending fly ball to James Tibbs. What seemed like a comfortable afternoon turned into a dogfight as GT trailed 8-6 with two innings to go. Give credit to the GT lineup, which does not have many holes and has .300 batting average players everywhere, but this trend occurred far too much this season.
With two runners on and one out in, Drew Faurot initiated the Seminole response in the eighth.
He fielded a ground ball, alertly tagged the runner to second, and fired to Cantu to end the frame. After coming through with the glove, he answered the bell with his bat and hit an opposite-field double that scored Lodise in the bottom half. Max Williams kept the line moving with a two-out single to score the 2B before Tibbs broke the game open with a single that split the shift and brought two runs in. After giving up five in the seventh, the ‘Noles responded with four in the eighth to take a 12-6 lead into the final frame.
However, it can never be easy with this Seminole team as they learn what it takes to win when the games matter. Connor Hults started the ninth after retiring the side the inning before but allowed a lead-off home run and two walks, leading to Link turning to the bullpen again. Andrew Armstrong came in, but a single loaded the bases, and the head coach did not want to mess around. Jarrett brought in Seminole ace Jamie Arnold to finish off Georgia Tech. He almost turned two on the first batter, but two runs and two hitters later, he recorded the game-winning strikeout, and FSU took game one in pool play 12-9.
The Florida State lineup came through when they needed. They scored eight or more runs in all four games against GT this week and continue to rack up home runs. Most importantly, the scoring came from all over the lineup, as eight out of nine hitters recorded a knock, and half of them had multiple. On the flip side, if the bullpen cannot close out games, it will be a short June in Tallahassee. Arnold was a break-in-case-of-emergency play for Jarrett, and he smashed the glass to keep their super-regional hopes alive. After Georgia lost in the first round of the SEC tournament, the Seminoles should just need a win against Virginia on Friday to secure a top-eight seed.
Whether the pitching can hold on will be the deciding factor.
