Ongoing UF Softball Commentary

Missouri beat Tennessee 3-0 and will face the UF/Arky winner in the SEC title game Saturday at 5 pm. UT played 2 games, a total of 20 innings, and scored 1 run. Missouri pitchers have thrown 3 straight shutouts. Impressive. The Gator game should start around 8:15.

 

Looks like it's going to be on ESPN3 via the WatchESPN app. Not ESPN+.

 

I correct myself. The game IS on ESPN2. The ESPN3 broadcast is in Spanish.

 

Yep. Rylee made some great pitches and then went brain dead about what to do with balls hit back at her. Would have gotten out of the inning unscathed by just making a couple of routine plays. Too bad.

 

UF softball (43-16) fell to Arkansas for the 4th time this year 4-1 and they now await their seeding and matchups in the NCAA tournament. They will definitely host a Regional, but will have to travel for a Super Regional to advance. The Gators scored their only run in the top of the 1st on a leadoff double from Kendra Falby, a single by Hannah Adams and a sac. fly from Charla Echols. They have a couple more chances to score off SEC Pitcher of the Year Chenise Delce, but just couldn't get the big hit. Lexie Delbrey walked the 1st 2 batters she faced and then got out of the jam in the bottom of the first and had a no hitter going to the 4th inning. But she gave up an infield single, a walk and another infield single to load the bases before being relived by Rylee Trlicek. Trlicek got a bouncer back to her and she forced the runner at home for the 1st out. She then induced another grounder back to her, but she looked to first, hesitated and then made a wild throw home for an error, allowing 2 runs to score. The next batter hit a weak spinner back towards the mound, which Trlicek let go and another run scored. The following batter hit another weak grounder to the pitcher and she didn't hold the runner at third, throwing quickly to 1st, allowing the 4th run to score. And that was the game. 3 unearned runs. Florida had 5 hits to Arkansas' 4 and Rylee made several great pitches that got easy grounders right back to her. But she made 3 bad judgments in a rwo and that made the difference. Now we await the NCAA pairings and hope we can go on a run and make it to the WCWS.

 

Totally disagree. Trlicek pitched great and induced easy ground balls that would have gotten us out of the inning with no runs scored. She just didn't make the defensive plays that were needed. Delbrey had pitched pretty well, but has little command of the strike zone. They had bases loaded, no outs. The move was the correct one, IMO and Trlicek pitched great, but reacted poorly as a fielder. But you don't beat a team like Arkansas scoring only 1 run. UF's problem all year has been primarily on offense. Tonight defensive lapses factored in, but you can't expect to win 1-0.

 

Who would you rather have in the Gainesville Regional - UCF or USF? UCF won the AAC regular season and conference tournament titles, are 46-12, #16 in the latest RPI, #17 in 2 regular Top 25 polls and #21 in another. USF finished 3rd in the AAC regular season and runner-up in the tournament. They are 44-14, #38 in the RPI. During the season we beat UCF 12-11 & 10-3; beat USF 12-0 & 1-0. While UCF could be selected as a Regional host with a 15 or 16 seed, I doubt they will have 3 teams from the state of Florida hosting a regional. But with Florida probably getting a 12, 13 or 14 seed, I can see the committee putting UCF as the #2 seed in Gainesville and sending USF to Tallahassee. With Georgina Corrick in the circle, USF is capable of shutting out anybody. But their offense is not very good. UCF has a much better hitting team; their pitching is pretty good, but not great. Thoughts?

 

The NCAA will not put another SEC team in the Regional where an SEC team hosts. They just don't do that. We'll see what happens, but a projection that came out yesterday has Florida as the #12 seed (paired with #5 Alabama for a Super Regional), with UCF as the #2 seed in our Regional. I hope they actually match us up against a non-SEC team for a Super Regional, even if it means dropping us down to #13. The have the Top 8 seeds as: Oklahoma, FSU, Virginia Tech, Arkansas, Alabama, UCLA, Tennessee & Northwestern.