FSU baseball looks to defeat Miami Hurricanes, Claim State Championship

FSU baseball 27-5, 7-5 ACC) will look to keep its momentum after demolishing the rival Florida Gators Tuesday night when they welcome the rival Miami Hurricanes (16-16, 6-9 ACC) to Dick Howser Stadium for a three-game ACC series. A series win over the Hurricanes would give the Noles a legitimate claim to the State Championship after sweeping all three games from the Gators. Miami's record is a bit deceiving and similar to Florida's in that they've dropped some midweek games but played some good teams tough. They got swept last weekend by Duke on the road, but all three games were lost by one run. They hit .296 as a team with a .399 on-base percentage. They can hit for some power(48 home runs) but are not much of a threat on the basepaths(12 of 20). They have a .970 fielding percentage. Their starting pitchers on the weekend are good. They all strike out about a batter per inning and don't walk many guys. They will be around the plate and don't give up many home runs. FSU will go into this series without Cam Leiter and Conner Whittaker on the mound. Jamie Arnold, Brady Louck, and Conner Dorsey will be the starters. Luckily, Dorsey started in Leiter's absence last weekend and did well. Louck has been solid in limited action with two starts. 

Keys To Victory 

Hopefully, FSU batters saved some hits in their bats from the Florida game. Miami pitchers usually don't exit games too early, and one has two complete games this season. FSU hitters will need to be patient and not overly aggressive to try and get into a Miami bullpen that hasn't been great and isn't very deep. They must capitalize on the little things, like getting runners home from third base with less than two outs. FSU has been solid defensively, so FSU pitchers need to throw strikes. Louck and Dorsey can be sporadic at times, especially the latter, but the FSU bullpen should be fairly fresh since they didn't have to use a ton of arms against Florida. Although FSU will be short-handed on the mound, I think they have enough to take the series as long as they get solid pitching. The first game will be Thursday at 7 p.m. and will air on the ACC Network.