Iconic swing delivers again, and Wes Mendes leads FSU past Northern Kentucky

Florida State baseball (11-2) pushed its winning streak to seven games with a 7-3 win over Northern Kentucky on Friday night. FSU starting pitcher Wes Mendes continues to dominate, striking out 12 batters and only allowing one hit to pick up his fourth win this season.

The only downside to his performance was four walks on 94 pitches in 5.1 innings. Relief pitcher Chris Knier was perfect, throwing 3.2 innings, allowing no runs, walks, and striking out four on only 36 pitches.

The FSU offense scored seven runs on 10 hits, with Noah Sheffield hitting his second career home run to lead off the bottom of the first inning. He also had two RBI. Hunter Carns, Kelvyn Paulino Jr, and Will Bavaro had two hits. The latter hit his second home run in as many games and had two RBI.

FSU batters walked six times and struck out nine times, leaving 10 runners on base. They scored one run in every inning except the bottom of the fifth.

Northern Kentucky isn't a great team and FSU expects to win the series. In fact, it will be a disappointment if they don't get the three-game sweep. However, college baseball is proving that anyone can lose to anyone on any given day.

It seems like the offense is starting to find some continuity, although the strikeouts are still a bit too high. If FSU can get starting pitching and a bullpen effort like this every night? The offense won't need to put up crazy numbers to win games. This team is still a work in progress, but as I wrote earlier this week, I'm still optimistic about what they can do. They will return to action on Saturday at 2 p.m. ET against Northern Kentucky.