The Gators seemed to have a great chance to take the lead in the tenth after freshman Josh Rivera doubled down the first base line and then advanced to third on a wild pitch, but perished there when Cal Greenfield flied out. Each ace gave up a lone run, and the teams were deadlocked at one after nine innings. It started on Friday night, a classic pitcher’s duel between Miami’s Brian Van Belle and Florida’s Tommy Mace. Because only an elite team has it in them to pull out three straight nail biters over the top ranked team in the nation.
So that’s all major bragging rights over an in-state foe.īut while bragging rights are admittedly a great deal of fun, what’s more important is that after this past weekend, it’s become clear that this Gator baseball season has the chance to be a special one.
#Gator time all timely series
To clarify, I’m not talking about beating the Canes in football and basketball and winning the season series in baseball no, I’m talking about winning every single game in each of those so-called “Big 3 sports” that the two schools played in the same year (with at least one game played in each sport). And on top of all that, the Gators 1-2 punched Miami out of the 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2015 NCAA Tournament- the latter example of which was a pair of annihilations in the 2015 College World Series by a combined score of 25-5.Īlso worth noting is that Florida has now swept Miami in football, basketball and baseball in the 2019-20 academic year, which is the first time this has happened in the in-state rivalry’s history. Florida has also won six consecutive regular season series over their rivals to the south, and ten of the last eleven- two of the last four of which were sweeps. 13 of those 33 were routs, coming by five runs or more, and four were shutouts.
Since the 2009 NCAA Gainesville Regional, Florida has now beaten Miami 33 times in the last 41 games, including five straight dating back to last year’s series. That dominance is worth a closer look, because it’s simply nothing short of astounding. The sweep puts Florida at 8-0 for just the fifth time ever, and the first since 2002. First came a 2-1 thriller on Friday night in eleven innings, then came an exhilarating 7-4 victory in ten innings, and for a finale, the Gators took down the Hurricanes 5-3 on Sunday afternoon to extend Florida’s dominance in the series.
Traveling down to Coral Gables as the #2 team in the land according to, Kevin O’Sullivan’s Florida squad methodically dispatched Miami, the only team ranked higher than them in those rankings, in three straight games. It’s too early to declare the answer as clear- but early signs are as bright as the sun. Photo credit: University of Florida an uncharacteristically down 2019 Gator baseball season, fans might have been left wondering what was to come in 2020.
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