NCAA Baseball Super Regionals 2011, Florida Vs. Mississippi St: Gators Advance To College World Series

Florida and Mississippi State’s NCAA Super Regional matchup in Gainesville looked like a mismatch after the Gators’ 11-1 win on Friday. And Florida did eventually prevail, winning 8-6 in Sunday’s Game Three, but not until after one a stirring, topsy-turvy series.

Florida pounced early in Game Three, building a 4-0 lead in the first two innings on home runs by Mike Zunino, Daniel Pigott, and Vickash Ramjit, but let some of that lead erode when starter Alex Panteliodis gave up a three-run homer to the Bulldogs’ Game 2 hero, Nick Vickerson, in the fourth inning.

Down 6-4 to SEC rival Mississippi State in their NCAA Super Regional, the Florida Gators had Mike Zunino coming to the plate with two men on and no outs in the bottom of the seventh inning. Florida coach Kevin O’Sullivan, naturally, decided to let the SEC Player of the Year and home run leader sacrifice bunt.

↵Zunino did that effectively, moving runners from first and second to second and third, but the damage was done and the anti-bunting crowd was ablaze, including ESPN’s Keith Law, who torched the move in a tweet:

From the third inning until the last pitch of the game, the Florida Gators lead Game 2 of their Super Regional against the Mississippi State Bulldogs. At no point in the first 17 innings of this series did they trail. Then, with the first pitch he was thrown by relief pitcher Steven Rodriguez, Nick Vickerson hit a two-run walk-off home run to give the Bulldogs a 4-3 win over the Gators, allowing them to live to fight another day.

Florida’s offense has been the best in the tournament so far, but they were contained today by Nick Routt and Caleb Reed, who both had solid outings. Reed came in as a reliever in the 4th inning and pitched through the rest of the game, allowing just one earned run against a potent Gators offense.

The Florida Gators are in position to advance to Omaha for the College World Series early on in Game 2 of their NCAA Baseball Tournament Super Regional against the Mississippi State Bulldogs, but Nick Routt isn’t making it easy on them. It hasn’t been the typical Florida offensive shellacking so far, but they’ve done well to manufacture a run, and they lead by a score of 1-0 after three innings.

In the top of the 3rd inning, Cody Dent singled, then was moved over to third base on a double by leadoff hitter Bryson Smith. It should have never been a double, though, as Jaron Shepherd mis-timed his jump at the warning track and missed the ball on what should have been a flyout that allowed Dent to advance to second. Instead, Dent got to third and was scored on a sacrifice fly Nolan Fontana. It looked like Mike Zunino was going to drive in Smith from second, but his line drive was impressively snagged by shortstop Jonathan Ogden. Preston Tucker couldn’t advance Smith either, and the inning ended with Florida scoring just one run when it looked like they had the potential for much more.

The Florida Gators have done everything that was expected of them and more this afternoon in Gainesville in the first game of their Super Regional series, and they’re halfway to the College World Series after an 11-1 win over the Mississippi State Bulldogs.

Hudson Randall put together a fantastic start, going eight strong innings, giving up just one earned. He threw 115 pitches - 81 of them strikes - to go along with a line of six hits, two walks, and a season high eight strikeouts. Keenan Kish closed out the game in the ninth inning as Florida got to save their talented bullpen.

Today was not Evan Mitchell’s day. The Mississippi State Bulldogs’ starting pitcher finished just two innings, giving up a solo home run to Mike Zunino on the very first pitch of the bottom of the third inning. He was pulled for reliever Devin Jones, who should be able to give the Bulldogs multiple innings.

Mitchell gave up four runs in the fourth inning, two in the second, and then finally one in the third inning. Zunino is having a field day so far, as he’s 2-2 with a home run and three RBI. The Gators lead by a score of 7-0 in the bottom of the third inning, and based on what they did in their first three games of the NCAA Baseball Tournament, the offense that they’re putting up shouldn’t surprise anyone.

It’s been an eventful start in Gainesville for the first NCAA Baseball Tournament Super Regional, and the Mississippi State Bulldogs are already in a hole after the first inning. Florida Gators starting pitcher Hudson Randall got through four batters in 13 pitches in the first inning, but things didn’t go quite as well for Evan Mitchell, who struggled through a four run Florida inning. Against his first three batters faced, he threw just two strikes and walked two of the three batters.

With the bases loaded and no outs, SEC Player of the Year Mike Zunino singled right center field, driving in two runs. Two batters later, Tyler Thompson added two RBI of his own with a double to the same spot that caught C.T. Bradford playing shallow in center field. Mitchell eventually got out of the inning when Thompson was caught trying to steal third base and Daniel Pigott grounded out shortly afterwards, but the damage was done. After just one inning, the Florida Gators lead the Mississippi Bulldogs by a score of 4-0.

It’s an all-SEC affair in the Gainesville Super Regional this weekend as Florida and Mississippi State do battle in the NCAA Baseball championship with a spot in the College World Series on the line. And despite all of the talk about the conference’s depth, there is a distinct divide in the SEC.

There is the SEC West, where .500 was good enough for Arkansas to win the division, and then there is the SEC East, where three teams were good enough to earn national seeds (the Gators are the No. 2 overall seed).