The Florida Gators dropped to the loser’s bracket of the Gainesville Regional following a 4-5 loss to Texas Tech on Saturday night.
Gator Country provides you with postgame quotes from Head Coach Kevin O’Sullivan and starting pitcher Brandon Sproat.
On Brandon Sproat’s outing…
“I thought Brandon threw the ball good. Gave up three (runs) over six (innings)for a quality start. He did everything we asked him to do. We made a couple of key mistakes during the game that ended up hurting us a bit, but Texas Tech played really good. Their starter was really good. But we had our opportunities, just didn’t have our best at-bats in the most crucial times.”
On the recent slump at the plate…
“We had a good game plan; their starter was just really good. His changeup was really good and he was up to 96 and was coming off a really good start last week in the conference tournament. He threw the ball good and we had a good game plan but the guy came in and threw sliders. We got the leadoff man on with Josh (Rivera) but struck out, struck out and hit a ground ball to third. We had the bases loaded with one out and needed to elevate the ball and didn’t. We had first and third with one out and called an offensive timeout and Michael (Robinson) is supposed to get the ball down first base line because first baseman was holding the runner on and he put it down the third baseline and we didn’t score a run, so the little things cost you in a game like this.
On the message to the team…
“We are disappointed but have to flush it. Nothing else to do but win the next three games. We have to win tomorrow against UCONN and then move on hopefully to the second game and be successful there and then move on to the next one. It’s really that simple. We put ourselves in this position but its certainly doable. We have enough pitching to do it, we just have to win tomorrow.”
Junior Pitcher Brandon Sproat
On regrouping as a team…
“We were in this position last year and ended up coming up short in the last game. Tomorrow we have take it one pitch at a time, and really slow it down.”
On how last years’ experience can impact this year…
“Last year we learned from our mistakes with the loss that we took, learn from those, and move forward. Like I said, we just need to take it one pitch at a time and keep on pushing. None of these guys are ready to be done yet.”
On the homers he gave up…
“The two-run homer, props to that guy. He kept fouling off, fouling off, and got his pitch and got a good swing off. Props to him. The other one was a first pitch heater. He was hunting the fastball and got a good swing off and props to those two guys.”
Florida needs to win two games on Sunday to stay alive in the Gainesville Regional and three in a row to advance to the Super Regionals.
The Gators are set to take on two-seed UConn at noon.