Bulls Begin May With top-25 Showdown at No. 1 Florida
Matchup: No. 22
USF (29-15, 11-7 The American) at No. 1 Florida (38-11, 18-6 SEC)
Date: Tuesday, May 8
Time: 6 p.m.
Location: Gainesville, Fla. | Alfred A. McKethan Stadium (6,244)
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Game Notes
TAMPA, May 7, 2018 – Rested following a rare bye week, the University of South Florida baseball team opens a stretch of eight-consecutive road games to close out the regular season at No. 1 Florida, Tuesday at 6 p.m. on the SEC Network +.
The Bulls (29-15, 11-7 The American) closed out April and the final week at home winning 3-of-4 against Bethune-Cookman and Memphis. For a third-straight week, the Bulls find themselves in the top-25 of four major polls, which includes a No. 22 ranking according to Perfect Game, a No. 23 ranking according to Baseball America and the 24
th spot in D1Baseball's top-25.
Junior outfielder
Kyle Phillips (Orlando) hit .500 against the Tigers and classmate
Coco Montes (Miami) hit .308 with a team-best four RBI. Junior
David Villar (Pembroke Pines, Fla.) hit two homers in the first game of the series, the second game he has smashed a pair of blasts this season.
Lefty All-American
Shane McClanahan (Cape Coral, Fla.) was named to the American Athletic Conference Weekly Honor Roll on April 30 after logging a season and career-long 7.0 innings in Game 1 against Memphis. He struck out 13 and allowed only three hits to guide the Bulls to a 4-2 win. McClanahan leads the country with 15.21 strikeouts per nine innings, is seventh nationally with 107 strikeouts and sixth with 4.97 hits allowed per nine innings.
Sophomore lefty
Noah Yager (Davie, Fla.) will start Tuesday. It'll be his first start of the season. Yager allowed just seven hits and two earned run over 12.2 innings with three walks and 19 strikeouts. On April 17 against UNF, Yager got the win out of the bullpen, pitching the final 5.1 scoreless innings and compiling a career-best 10 K's.
SERIES HISTORY
Tuesday marks the 88th meeting between the Bulls and Gators. Florida holds a 61-25 edge in the all-time series and 38-9 advantage in Gainesville. But USF defeated Florida on the road last year, 15-10, ending what was a six-game slide. It was the second-most runs that the Bulls had scored against the Gators, and the most since 1989. The two sides met in the 2017 Gainesville Regional in June as the top two seeds, but UF got by the Bulls in a 12-inning battle, 5-1.
SCOUTING REPORT
The 2018 Gators are considered to be even better than the team that won the national title in 2017. Sitting at 38-11 and 18-6 in the competitive SEC, Florida enters the week ranked No. 1 and led by one of the best players in the nation, junior Jonathan India. He is hitting .392 with 15 home runs, 53 runs scored, 10 doubles and 38 RBI. Senior JJ Schwarz is hitting .317 with 14 doubles, 46 runs and 41 RBI. Wil Dalton is seventh in the nation with 16 homers and leads the Gators with 48 RBI.
The pitching staff leads the SEC with a 3.14 ERA and 7.32 hits allowed per nine innings. Righty Tyler Dyson has been in the weekend rotation for most of the year and will get the start Tuesday. He is 5-3 with a 3.78 ERA and 51 strikeouts in 50.0 inning pitched. Michael Byrne holds a 1.46 ERA with 11 saves in 23 appearances to lead the UF bullpen.
NOTA-BULLS
- Villar still leads the Bulls with a .373 average to sit second in The American. He is second in the league with 17 doubles and third with his 11 home runs.
- The Bulls are tops in The American with a .290 team average and a .458 slugging, and they are second in scoring at 6.2 runs per. USF is also second with 435 hits and it is sixth nationally with 110 doubles.
- USF's pitching leads the conference and is fourth in the country with 10.3 strikeouts per nine innings.
About USF Baseball
The University of South Florida baseball team is one of the fastest rising programs in the country. The Bulls reached the NCAA Regionals in 2015 for the first time in 13 years and followed that success with a 42-19 record and second NCAA regional trip in three years in 2017. The Bulls earned just their second and third wins over top-five ranked teams with victories against then-No. 3 Florida State and at then-No. 5 Florida during the 2017 season. During the 2017 season, USF reached the 40-win mark for the first time since 1996 and entered the top-25 in the major collegiate baseball polls for the first time since 2013. The USF Baseball program has won five conference titles and the Bulls have made 12 NCAA appearances.
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