After being swept by No.1 Tennessee last weekend, No.13 Florida baseball opened week six with a 16-4 run rule of Jacksonville, improving to 17-5 (0-3 SEC) on the 2025 season. The Gators scored three runs or more in the 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th innings of the contest. Freshman infielder Brendan Lawson, junior infielder Justin Nadeau, and sophomore outfielder Landon Stripling all connected on three run home runs in the contest. Florida completed the midweek sweep of Jacksonville after defeating the Dolphins 10-4 on February 18th.
“There’s two things we needed tonight. We needed to have a really good night offensively after the weekend and to play seven innings with five games this week. Normally we don’t play five games during the week when we start conference play, but to close that thing out and only have to use three pitchers was obviously helpful,” head coach Kevin O’Sullivan said postgame.
Lawson leads the way
Freshman infielder Brendan Lawson led the way for Florida, plating a game high five runs on three hits. Lawson’s five RBI tied his career high in a single game and moved him within one RBI of Bobby Boser’s team high 25 RBI this season.
With the Gators leading 1-0 in the bottom of the third, Lawson went opposite field for his 5th home run of the season, a three-run shot to give Florida a 4-0 lead. On his next at bat, Lawson cleared the bases with a two RBI double to left field, extending Florida’s lead to 7-2.
“He can hit. He doesn’t swing and miss very much. He had a great night at the plate. A really good night at the plate,” O’Sullivan said on Lawson.
Lawson reached base in four of his five plate appearances vs JU and now holds a .367 batting average on the season.
Bounce back Barberi
Freshman RHP Jackson Barberi bounced back in a big way vs Jacksonville after allowing five earned runs while recording just one out in his last appearance vs No.1 Tennessee. Barberi got the Gators off to a good start with three scoreless frames while allowing just two hits. Barberi was able to work around a leadoff double in the 3rd with a pair of strikeouts.
“I thought he was fairly efficient; the goal was to keep him to about 45 pitches and just get him right back out there after the weekend. I thought he got us off to a good start.”
Part of Kevin O’Sullivan’s developmental process for younger pitchers is to get them back on the mound as quickly as possible after a bad outing. If you exclude his outing vs Tennessee, Barberi has allowed just two runs in 12.1 innings pitched. As it stands, Barberi holds a 4.97 ERA and has posted a scoreless outing in five of eight appearances. With LHP Frank Menendez out for the season, Florida will likely lean on Barberi for extended innings over the weekends.
Justin Nadeau vs former team
Junior infielder Justin Nadeau launched his first home run of the 2025 season against his former team on Tuesday night, a three-run shot that cleared the fence in right field.
“I try to stay true to myself, especially with the way I play the game. I just try to do my job, put up competitive at bats, put the ball in play, just got the right pitch at the right time, took a good swing on it, felt really good off the bat, and everything else happened from there,” Nadeau said postgame.
Nadeau plated four runs on two hits while scoring three runs out of the leadoff spot. The 6’0, 195-pound utility man has earned the leadoff spot for UF due to his ability to hit for average, get on base, and work pitch counts.
This was the second time Nadeau has faced his former team, and the second time he’s posted a multi-hit game vs JU. In their first matchup on February 18th, Nadeau was 3-3 at the plate with an RBI and a run scored.
Nadeau has a .400 batting average on the 2025 season, which ranks 2nd on the Gators behind Colby Shelton.
Cade Kurland
Junior infielder Cade Kurland returned to action for the first time since suffering a shoulder injury on March 1st vs Miami. In the third inning, Kurland was removed from the game mid at bat after appearing to be in pain after a swing.
“The shoulder did not pop out, so that’s the encouraging thing,” O’Sullivan said on Kurland postgame. “I just saw him grimace a little bit on the second swing. There’s no sense of pushing it right there so he’ll get with the trainers and everybody and kind of look at it. Like I said, the most important thing is it didn’t pop out, it was just maybe a little bit too soon.”
UP NEXT
Florida will host Florida A&M on Wednesday night before hosting No.4 Georgia for a three-game series from March 21-23.