17-05-2025
Florida baseball drops second game of final regular-season series to Alabama Crimson Tide
Florida baseball drops second game of final regular-season series to Alabama Crimson Tide
Florida baseball was unable to follow up on its series-opening win over the Alabama Crimson Tide on Friday night. Instead, the Gators came up short in a 9-6 defeat at Condron Family Ballpark in the penultimate game of the 2025 regular-season schedule.
It was a five-run fifth inning that ultimately sank the ship for Kevin O'Sullivan's squad, but these reptiles did not go down without a fight.
Florida scored unanswered runs in the first and second innings, getting out to a 2-0 lead before 'Bama's bats started booming. The Tide tacked two on the board in the third and then exploded in the fifth to run out to a 7-2 lead; they would tack on two more insurance runs in the top of the ninth.
Down 9-2 in the bottom of the ninth, the Gators managed to plate four runners, but the deficit was simply too much to overcome, resulting in the 9-6 loss.
Florida's pitching summary
Pierce Coppola got the start and looked pretty sharp, allowing a pair of runs on three hits and no walks while striking out a whopping 10 over 3 2/3 frames. Billy Barlow took the loss by following him with three runs surrendered (one earned) in 2/3 innings, while Christian Rodriguez also coughed up a couple of runs (neither earned) after him.
Blaine Rowland gave the Gators 2 2/3 frames of hitless, scoreless ball before Cade McDonald came in and surrendered those final two runs in the ninth.
Florida's hitting summary
A trio of Gators finished with three hits — Brody Donay, Bobby Boser and Ty Evans — with four others reaching base on a hit. Blake Brookins made his first-career start — taking up the designated hitter spot — and went 1-for-4 with a double; Boser also smacked a double for Florida.
While the team managed 10 total hits, they also drew only three walks and struck out a dozen times with half of them split equally between Brookins and Brendan Lawson. Florida left seven runners on base.
Kevin O'Sullivan talks about Coppola's performance
"Yeah, he pitched really good. The only mistake he probably made was trying to go fastball off the plate with Lebron, ran the count to 2-2 with a slider, but we get a sac fly there, and other than that I thought he pitched the ball really well and the positive was we got him up to 67 pitches," the head coach notes.
"The whole goal is that we could get him to a point where we get five innings out of him out of a start. I think that's great, obviously going to help us moving forward."
Next up for Florida baseball
The Gators will take on the Crimson Tide in the final game of the regular season on Saturday, May 17, starting at 4 p.m. ET. The game will be broadcast on the SEC Network+ and can be heard on WRUF.
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