If you make a list of all their deficiencies, you wonder how it is the Florida Gators are in the position they’re in, one win away from winning an NCAA Regional and hosting a Super Regional next weekend. They don’t hit with enough power. They have lapses in the field. Their starting pitching isn’t going to overwhelm anybody and if you’re in the bullpen and you’ve got a pulse, you can expect to get the call on any given night. If you’re looking for flaws, you could go on and on. Yet if you’re looking for a team that has a real shot at making the College World Series, look no further.
The dream of making the College World Series probably seemed like the longest of shots back in March when Miami came into Gainesville and swept the Gators in a manner that exposed every one of their weaknesses. A couple of months later, the Gators still have those same weaknesses but they’ve found themselves as a team and the College World Series is no longer a crazy idea but an achievable reality.
The Gators have a chance to make it to Omaha for college baseball’s version of the Big Dance by using a strength in numbers approach. Out of necessity Coach Kevin O’Sullivan has put together a team that compensates for its lack of genuine stars with a get the job done approach that involves everyone on the roster.
This is a team that is filled with able contributors. They come to the ball yard every single day knowing O’Sullivan finds a way to blend all of their talents together. Instead of a complacent bench filled with guys worrying when and if they’ll ever see the field, he’s got a team of alert players ready to hear their name called.
“It [lack of stars] forces you into using a lot of guys and when you have to use a lot of guys, they feel they are contributing and it’s easier to build that team chemistry,” O’Sullivan said Saturday night after the Gators sent Miami into the loser’s bracket of the Gainesville Regional with an 8-2 thumping in front of a McKethan Stadium crowd of 4,109. Miami will face Jacksonville in an elimination game Sunday and the winner will have the daunting task of beating the Gators twice.
O’Sullivan used six pitchers and 19 players overall in beating Bethune-Cookman Friday night in the opening round of regional play. Saturday he only needed 14 players, three of them pitchers, to dispose of Miami.
Pitching tends to get done by committee. O’Sullivan isn’t beyond using every one of his pitchers in a game if that’s what it takes to win. Starters are asked to give it whatever they have and after that, it’s a matter of finding the right guy to get the job done.
“There’s not one guy on the pitching staff that’s our go-to guy,” O’Sullivan said.
Stephen Locke sure looked like a go-to guy the way he mowed down Miami for 7-1/3 innings Saturday night. He gave up two unearned runs in the third inning and held the Hurricanes in check until he gave out of gas with one out in the eighth. No problem there. Freshman Nick Maronde came on to get the final two outs and then turned it over to closer Billy Bullock, the closest thing the Gators have to a star on the pitching staff. Bullock, who got the win in relief Friday night, struck out two of the three batters he faced in the ninth to put the crowning touch on the win.
“We haven’t got a star pitcher with 12 or 13 or 14 wins but we have a lot of depth and we use it to our advantage,” O’Sullivan said.
There is a lot of depth in the dugout, too. Early in the season when he still was trying to piece it all together, O’Sullivan experimented with different lineups and batting orders nearly every game. It might have seemed rather helter-skelter at first, but somewhere about midseason it began to pay off mightily.
Starting with sweeps on successive weekends against South Carolina in Gainesville and Georgia up in Athens, the Gators took control of the Eastern Division of the Southeastern Conference. Using that play it by committee approach, the Gators won their division and earned a chance to host the regional.
In their two games so far, they’ve shown what real teamwork is all about. The Gators laid down sacrifice bunts. They hit grounders to the right side of the infield to move runners along. They worked Miami starter Chris Hernandez silly by taking a lot of pitches and forcing him to throw 110 pitches in only 5-1/3 innings.
Friday night’s hero was Teddy Foster, the number three catcher. His two-run single in the bottom of the ninth gave the Gators their 26th come-from-behind win of the season. Foster’s play earned him the start Saturday and he delivered an RBI single in the sixth and a sacrifice bunt in the eighth that helped the Gators add an insurance run.
Jonathan Pigott, who spent most of the season on the bench, continued his hot streak by singling home Florida’s first run in the third inning and hitting his fifth homer of the postseason to lead off the seventh.
Jerico Weitzel, a .211 hitter, was inserted into the game in the top of the eighth as a defensive replacement for senior Brandon McArthur. He made his presence felt immediately when he speared Scott Lawson’s leadoff grounder in the hole then got to his feet to finish the play with a perfect throw to Preston Tucker at first.
Everybody that got in the game contributed something. They did all the little things that matter most, which is why they won the game and why they are in the ideal position of needing just one more win to capture the regional. For Jacksonville or Miami, the prospects of winning the regional are slim because they will have to win three games to get the job done.
O’Sullivan says coaching this team is fun because the chemistry is right and it’s a team that never says die. Saturday night’s win was the 27th of Florida’s 41 victories in which the Gators have had to come from behind.
“They’re fun to coach although they do drive me a little bit crazy with all those come from behind wins,” O’Sullivan said with a grin.
The comeback wins are evidence that the team has chemistry and confidence. While there aren’t the dominating stars that you might find on other teams, the Gators do have a unique blend of talent and a coach that knows how to fit all the pieces together.
They don’t worry about all the things they might lack because they’re too busy doing whatever it takes to win that next game.
“We believe in ourselves,” O’Sullivan said. “The only thing that matters to us is what the guys in our locker room think about themselves and they think we’re a pretty good team. We’re gritty and we’re willing to grind out wins. We believe that if you’re going to beat us, you better bring your best shot every time.”
Others might worry about all the things the Gators lack, but the only guys that count believe they can make dreams come true. The dream since day one has been to get to the College World Series but there have been times this season when that might have seemed improbable, perhaps even impossible. After Saturday night, the Gators are one step closer into making an impossible dream a distinct possibility.