HATTIESBURG, Miss. – (May 4, 2019) – Behind five hits and seven RBI from Andru Summerall, the Florida Atlantic University baseball team set season highs in hits and runs in doubling up No. 29 Southern Miss on Saturday night, 18-9. The Owls moved into a tie for first place in the Conference USA standings with the Golden Eagles and clinched the road series with the win.
Quotable
Head Coach John McCormack:
“What a game. What an offensive night for our guys. They started the pressure in the first and kept it on all night. Mike Ruff made it stand up for five innings, he had to come out probably because of the long top half when we scored eight runs. To win the series here is not easy, haven’t done it (since 2015). Winning a series here is a really big deal. Proud of the way they played, especially offensively, really really good and really clutch at-bats.”
The Turning Point
FAU (32-14, 17-6 C-USA) scored first, in the first, on a two-out, two-run single by Mitchell Hartigan. Another run came in on a Joe Montes single in the third, and then the Owls exploded for eight in the fifth, on seven hits, while sending 11 batters to the plate.
The Finish
USM (30-15, 17-6 C-USA) got four in the sixth, but the Owls got those back the next at-bat, three coming in on a home run to right by Summerall, the other on a Hartigan double. Summerall would add another three-run shot in the eighth for an 18-4 lead. The Golden Eagles scored five times in the bottom of the ninth, but Dylan O’Connell came on to get the last two outs and the Owls can potentially get a road sweep with a win on Sunday.
The Arms
· Mike Ruff (5-3) allowed only two hits and struck out six in five-plus innings of work. He left after walking the leadoff batter in the sixth, and that runner would come in to score
· Jon Jon Kostantis threw scoreless innings in the seventh and eighth, and O’Connell got outs No. 26 and 27 on a flyball to center and popup to second base
The Bats
· Summerall set career highs with his 5-for-6 night, five runs and seven RBI. The five runs scored matches a program record set six times prior, the last being in 2013 by Nathan Pittman
· Saturday marked his third career two-homer game, to go along with a single and two doubles
· Hartigan went 4-for-4 (two doubles and two singles) with three RBI, and is 7-for-8 in the series thus far
· Eric Rivera reached five times, with three hits and two walks, scored three runs and had two RBI
· Bobby Morgensen and Pedro Pages both hit two-run home runs in the eight-run fifth. Morgensen was 3-for-5 on the night with two runs and two RBI
· Four players combined for seven doubles: two each by Rivera, Summerall and Hartigan and one by Wilfredo Alvarez
· The team had set the season highs in runs and hits in the seventh before adding more in each category later
· The 18 runs marked the most scored in a game since May 3, 2015, at UAB (an 18-4 win). The most before that was in a 20-3 win versus Arkansas State on May 10, 2008
What’s Next
The finale in Hattiesburg is set for 1 p.m. local (2 p.m. Eastern). Get tickets to the next home game (May 14 vs. UCF) by calling 1-866-FAU-OWLS.
– FAUSports.com –
Florida Atlantic University Athletics:
FAU Athletics is comprised of 21 intercollegiate teams involving 450 student-athletes that compete in baseball, basketball, cross country, football, golf, soccer, softball, swimming and diving, tennis, indoor and outdoor track, volleyball, beach volleyball, cheer and dance. The Owls are a NCAA Division I-A (FBS) institution and compete in Conference USA and the Coastal Collegiate Sports Association (CCSA) (beach volleyball, men’s swimming). The Owls have been playing football since 2001 and are a perfect 3-0 in bowl games, the most recent being a 50-3 victory over Akron in the 2017 Cheribundi Tart Cherry Boca Raton Bowl. The dance team finished its 2014 season No. 8, nationally. FAU cheer won a national championship in 2016.
About Florida Atlantic University:
Florida Atlantic University, established in 1961, officially opened its doors in 1964 as the fifth public university in Florida. Today, the University, with an annual economic impact of $6.3 billion, serves more than 30,000 undergraduate and graduate students at sites throughout its six county service region in southeast Florida. FAU’s world-class teaching and research faculty serves students through 10 colleges: the Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, the College of Business, the College for Design and Social Inquiry, the College of Education, the College of Engineering and Computer Science, the Graduate College, the Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College, the Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine, the Christine E. Lynn College of Nursing and the Charles E. Schmidt College of Science. FAU is ranked as a High Research Activity institution by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The University is placing special focus on the rapid development of critical areas that form the basis of its strategic plan: Healthy aging, biotech, coastal and marine issues, neuroscience, regenerative medicine, informatics, lifespan and the environment. These areas provide opportunities for faculty and students to build upon FAU’s existing strengths in research and scholarship. For more information, visit www.fau.edu.
