Larson lifts Florida Gators past Wake Forest in extra innings

A 3 p.m. start to Super Regionals between the Florida Gators (46-17) and Wake Forest Demon Deacons (42-19) turned into a late night in Gainesville on Saturday. The Gators and Deacons were set to play in what was expected to become and instant classic matchup, and Saturday’s game delivered.
Junior pitcher Alex Faedo took the mound for Florida as scheduled, but what had the potential to be one of his best outings of the year was cut short by the inevitable post-season weather delay.
Faedo pitched four scoreless innings, fanning nine Wake Forest batters and only giving up four hits and one walk to one of the strongest offenses in the country.
Florida’s offense helped him out by scratching one run across the plate in the third inning. Mike Rivera led off the inning with a single up the middle off Wake Forest’s starting pitcher Parker Dunshee, followed by a Deacon Liput walk to give the Gators runners on first and second with no outs.
Jonathan India then laid down a perfectly placed sacrifice bunt to move the runners up 90 feet and opened things up for a Dalton Guthrie RBI ground out to first base.
Faedo was seemingly getting better as the game went on, striking out the side for the second time of the day in the top of the fourth before the delay was called for lightning in the area.
At first, it seemed like it would be a short delay, much like the USF game in Regionals last weekend when Faedo returned to the game after a 38-minute break. But the minutes soon turned to hours and the chances of the ace returning to the game became slimmer as each one passed.
Finally, after three hours, 49 minutes, play resumed at McKethan Stadium, but Faedo’s night did not. On a night that offense was lacking, the Gators knew they would have to throw the best they had to keep the Deacons held off.
Head coach Kevin O’Sullivan opted to send what would have been Sunday’s starter, Brady Singer, to the mound, while Wake Forest left Dunshee in the game.
“The idea was, who else were we going to go to at that point?” O’Sullivan said on pitching Singer. “It was either pitch Jackson [Kowar] or pitch Brady. You know, if we would’ve scored a couple more runs, maybe we would’ve thrown [Austin] Langworthy for an inning or two and tried to bridge the gap, but I just know how well Wake Forest can hit and you’ve gotta win Game One.”
It was the right decision. Singer did everything in his power to put his team in a solid position to win the game. The next four innings flew by as Florida’s offense was nowhere to be found and Singer was dealing from the very first batter he faced.
He struck out two batters in the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth innings. He gave up a single in the seventh and a leadoff double in the eighth, but easily worked himself out of both mini-jams with some help from a couple of nice defensive plays on the infield by India and Guthrie.
For Singer, there was never a question about coming in, and he made the relief appearance of his life. “Yeah, in my mind,” he said when asked if he was prepared to come in on the chance there was a delay. “I knew I wanted to go and Sully came up to me and asked me, and it was a definite yes, and I was just fortunate enough to get out there.”
With Singer mowing the Deacons down through four innings, the new question was whether to send him back out for the ninth to get three more outs or to stick with the most reliable closer in the country this season.
There didn’t seem to be a wrong answer to that question. It really just came down to whether or not O’Sullivan believed he would need Singer again over the weekend. With that taken into consideration, Florida handed the game over to Michael Byrne.
Just two pitches into the ninth inning, Ben Breazeale, who was hitless in the game, took Byrne opposite field over the left field fence to tie the game 1-1. While it was a huge blow for the Gators, Byrne was unfazed, striking out the next two batters he faced and getting a deep, but harmless, fly out to right field.
Dunshee finally left the game after eight innings pitched as Griffin Roberts came in to pitch the ninth for the Deacons. Roberts sat the heart of the Gators’ lineup down in order to send the game to extra innings.
Wake Forest threatened in the top of the 10th inning with a leadoff single from Logan Harvey and a rare four-pitch walk by Byrne to Jonathan Pryor. The Gators caught a bit of a break on an attempted sacrifice bunt from Jake Mueller straight back to Byrne, who got the lead runner at third base.
Byrne then came up with a huge strike out of Golden Spikes Award contender Stuart Fairchild, but walked Gavin Sheets to load the bases with two outs and Breazeale coming back up to the plate. He was once again unaffected, striking out the batter who went yard on him to tie the game just one inning before.
“He’s got ice in his veins,” O’Sullivan said on Byrne. “He just flushed the home run and kept throwing strikes. He’s been doing that all year long for us.”
Byrne made quick work of the top of the 11th inning after giving up a leadoff single and sent his team to the bottom of the inning with another chance to win the game.
The Gators were struggling mightily on offense with just three hits in the game, with the last of those hits coming all the way back in the fifth inning. Things looked promising after India led off with a walk and advanced on a wild pitch.
Guthrie couldn’t advance him to third, fouling off three attempted bunts for the first out of the inning. JJ Schwarz and Maldonado both took a hit by pitch to load the bases with one out and pinch hitter Mike Kolozsvary coming to the plate.
The Deacons had seen enough from Roberts after three free passes in the inning and entered freshman Colin Peluse to try to get two more outs and keep the game alive.
Peluse got Kolozsvary on a three-pitch strikeout and senior Ryan Larson was the last hope to keep the rally alive. It was Larson’s first game back from injury as he missed Regionals after taking a pitch to the face in an at bat against Mississippi State in the SEC Tournament.
While he hadn’t seen much action in the last couple weeks, he was one of three Gators with a hit in the game, but hadn’t been seeing the ball well since his double in the second inning.
Larson took a fast ball over the plate straight back up the middle to score India from third and give Florida a 2-1 walk off win in the 11th inning. The team jumped from the bench to chase Larson all the way to center field for a celebration.
“I was watching those pitches off Mark and it looked like it had some ride to it,” Larson said of his thoughts before he stepped in the box. “And walking up there, I remember we were watching a game in the locker room a few days ago and Sully spit out some stat that 74 percent of game winning hits are up the middle or something like that, so I just decided to stay up the middle of the field.”
“Well, I think a lot of times you get these big hits from your older, more experienced players,” O’Sullivan added. “And he told you, most base hits that win ball games are through the middle of the field and they’re on the ground, not many are in the air. He stayed with the approach, and he was throwing all fast balls. He bounced a lot of his breaking balls in warm ups. He just put a really good, flat swing on it. I’m happy for him … I’m really happy for Ryan. He’s a senior and he deserves it.”
As for pitching over the next two games, the Gators are in a pretty good spot with all three pitchers from Game One still available for the rest of the weekend. Faedo threw the most of Florida’s pitchers with 72 pitches in four innings. Singer threw 52 in his four innings and Byrne threw 53 in three innings to close out the game.
For O’Sullivan, that was the biggest factor in taking Singer out after a shutdown performance.
“I felt there were a lot of emotional pitches that Brady had to make and we’ve gone to Michael Byrne the whole year in the ninth inning,” he said. “Their kid put a good swing on the pitch. I mean, what are you gonna do? He earned it, went the opposite way. And we still can use both these guys this weekend. I wouldn’t second guess that decision at all, because Michael’s been the guy at the end of the game, and quite honestly, we need Brady again this weekend, so it’s just that simple.”
The Gators are now just one win away from a trip to Omaha. Jackson Kowar will take the mound for Florida in Game Two on Sunday at 3 p.m. to try to finish the job. If Wake Forest takes the series to a third game, it could be another interesting mix of Faedo, Singer and Byrne on Monday.