FSU baseball: Noles face Gators in regular season rubbermatch

FSU baseball (32-18, 15-12 ACC) comes off a huge series win over the rival Miami Hurricanes and now faces the rival Florida Gators. The teams have split the first two games with the rubbermatch Tuesday night.

Florida batters are hitting .274 with an on-base percentage of .370 and have hit 93 home runs, 73 doubles, and 10 triples.

Florida pitchers will enter the contest with a 4.22 ERA, with opposing teams batting .239, with 454 strikeouts and 176 walks in 454 innings. They have allowed 50 home runs.

Defensively, Florida has 36 errors for a fielding percentage of .981.

FSU baseball pitchers enter the contest with a 3.74 ERA, with opposing teams batting .225 with 614 strikeouts and 162 walks in 456.2 innings.

FSU batters are hitting .262 with an on-base percentage of .364 and have 50 home runs, 100 doubles, and six triples.

Defensively, FSU has 59 errors for a fielding percentage of .968. FSU an RPI ranking of No. 16, compared to Florida’s No. 15 ranking.

Key To Victory

The FSU pitching staff threw a two-hit shutout the Gators in their last matchup. A combination of Jonah Scolaro, Conner Whittaker, Wyatt Crowell, and Davis Hare led the charge, with the FSU offense scoring all five of their runs in the first inning.

It was a pitcher’s duel after that, and Florida couldn’t get it going offensively. FSU will likely see Tyler Nesbitt and others from the Florida pitching staff again. FSU only had two hits after the first inning in that game but only struck out eight times.

However, the top part of the FSU batting order has been productive of late, and will need to find success early on the road. It’ll likely be Johnny Wholestaff for the Noles, and whoever is on the mound needs to throw strikes and avoid giving Florida anything.

UF has five batters with eight or more home runs, three with 14, 17, and 19. If they hit home runs, it needs to be with noone on base.

The game will take place Tuesday at 7 p.m. ET and will air on the SEC Network.