No.10 Florida baseball started off their 2025 season on a strong note, defeating Air Force 7-0 on opening day. Florida’s starting pitcher Liam Peterson stole the show, tossing six shutout innings while allowing just two hits and one walk on 74 pitches. The hard throwing right hander struck out 11 batters, which tied Hunter Barco’s opening day UF program record set in 2022 vs Liberty.
“You never know what to expect on Opening Day but hopefully starts like this continue for him and hopefully it shows the maturation and the hard work he’s put in,” head coach O’Sullivan said on Peterson outing.
As a pitching staff, Florida struck out 16 batters, which set Florida’s program record for strikeouts on opening day (previously 13 vs Liberty in 2022).
On a windy night where home runs were at a premium, designated hitter Brody Donay launched a baseball 448 feet over the bullpen in left center, putting the first run of Florida’s 2025 season on the board in the third inning.
Florida combined for 11 hits in 31 at bats (.355) while five Gators recorded a multi-hit game (Donay, Kurland, Boser, Shelton, Jones).
Breaking down Peterson’s start
It’s difficult to take anything away from nine innings of baseball, but Liam Peterson was phenomenal in his six innings of work vs Air Force. He looked comfortable and controlled the entire time, even when working with runners in scoring position and less than two outs. At one point Peterson tossed six straight balls, but a quick mound visit from coach O’Sullivan got him right back on track. Peterson threw 53 strikes on 74 total pitches, a strike percentage of 71.6%, a massive improvement from last season, although obviously a small sample size.
“Just wanted to pound the zone. Kind of came into this thinking they were gonna do a lot of small ball, didn’t want to beat myself and that was the goal going into it,” Peterson said postgame.
Peterson struck out 11 batters in his 2025 debut which included five in a row at one point.
“I thought my slider was moving pretty well. Kind of one thing I worked on, little bit of a newer pitch for me last year. The shape wasn’t always consistent but today I kept the shape and velo pretty consistent throughout. I had a good feel for it, so that was the biggest thing in this outing, landing that slider.”
It’s never easy to pitch on Opening Day with all the nerves and jitters that come with it, but today’s outing looked like a walk in the park for Peterson, who looked the part of an SEC ace on Friday night.
FINAL THOUGHTSÂ
The Gators stuck out just five times in 31 at bats on Friday night, an area in which Kevin O’Sullivan hoped to improve upon this season. Two of those five strikeouts came from Cade Kurland, who made up for it with his multi hit, three RBI game. Florida had some hard hit balls that didn’t go their way tonight as well.
RHP Caden McDonald and Jackson Barberi combined for three innings of relief where they allowed just one hit and struck out five. Both came in and pounded the zone to seal Florida’s victory.
Florida played elite defense highlighted by Cade Kurland’s sliding stop at 2nd base and Ty Evans’ hose from right field to nail a runner at third base.
The only disappointment of the day was base running, according to O’Sullivan. Miami transfer Blake Cyr was picked off the base paths twice, Ty Evans was caught in a run down after heading to an occupied base, and Kyle Jones made the last out at third, along with a few other minor mistakes.
Florida will play a double header vs Air Force on Saturday starting at 1:00 p.m.