OKLAHOMA
CITY -- Barely 24 hours earlier, Florida coach Tim Walton sat in the very same
seat in the NCAA interview room and was asked about the importance of bringing
an element of power to the College World Series.
“I
think you have to pitch and play defense,” he said. “Home runs come and go, especially
on a stage like this. So you have to do a good job of playing catch and
pitching well.”
And
if you don’t do either well you get an outcome like Thursday’s 9-2 loss at the
hands of Tennessee that threw the Gators, the No. 2 overall seed when the
64-team tournament began two weeks ago, into the elimination bracket.
All-America
pitcher Hannah Rogers threw just 26 pitches - 15 of them were balls as the
hurler struggled to find the strike zone. She was in the dugout before the end
of the first inning after walking three of the five batters she faced in what
turned into an early 3-0 deficit. Reliever Lauren Haeger was greeted by the
first batter she faced, Melissa Brown, with a two-run double and went on to
give up 10 hits and six runs.
Defensively,
the nation’s No. 3 fielding percentage team made some dazzling plays, but a
pair of ill-timed errors in the Tennessee sixth inning helped the Volunteers tack
on four runs a half-inning after the Gators had closed to 3-2.
Fielding?
Not their usual sterling effort.
Tough
day for the Gators’ lifeblood elements.
When
the game was over, Florida (55-8) had been handed its first lopsided loss of
the season -- the previous seven were by two runs or less -- and Tennessee
coach Ralph Weekly, during his turn with the media, found himself referencing
Walton’s remarks of the day before.
But
with a different spin.
“I
think it’s pitching and offense,” he said.
That
was easy for Weekly to say. He had both Thursday.
The
Vols, whose three games with the Gators during the regular season were each
decided in extra innings (UF won two), got the gift first inning, including a
walked-in run.
“Things
just weren’t going my way,” Rogers said.
After
exiting, Rogers watched the Vols pile up 11 hits, five for extra bases. The
final score could have been worse, as UT runners stranded 10 runners
UF
left nine of their own on the base paths and left ASA Hall of Stadium with just
four hits; two of them from freshman second baseman Kelsey Stewart.
“I
give Tennessee more credit than I take away from us,” Walton said. “They just
looked like the better ball club.”
The
Vols had the three-run cushion before their starting pitcher, Ellen Renfroe,
had taken the field. But the Gators, even with their ace done for the day, were
undeterred.
“No
one was down,” Stewart said of a squad made up mostly of first-timers on this
big stage. “We’d come back from bigger deficits than that.”
It
was Stewart who spanked a run-scoring triple in the UF fifth to start a rally
that had big-number potential. Hers was one of just two hits in the inning, yet
the Gators -- as they've done all season when it comes to manufacturing scoring
ops -- loaded the bases with two outs and freshman Taylor Schwarz, she of the
game-winning RBI in Sunday’s Super Regional clincher against UAB, coming to the
plate.
Schwarz
bounced into a force at third base, but UF had the momentum in clawing back
within 3-2.
Then
came Tennessee’s four-run sixth, marred by a throwing error from third baseman
Stephanie Tofft and fielding one from Stewart. Back-to-back doubles from Kat
Dotson and Lauren Gibson made it 7-2.
The
Vols got two more in their seventh, on three more hits (two for extra bases),
plus a wild pitch.
“We
didn’t play very well,” Walton said. “Uncharacteristic mistakes.”
No
question. Pitching and defense had carried the Gators all season, oftentimes
overcoming struggles on offense.
It
would be even more uncharacteristic if all three fail show up again Saturday
with the season on the line.
