CHARLOTTE, N.C. – (April 7, 2019) – Down 5-0 through three, and without a hit until the fourth, the Florida Atlantic University baseball team would go on to score 12 unanswered runs and finish out the weekend sweep of Charlotte on Sunday afternoon, 12-5.
With the win, the Owls improved to 23-9 overall, and stayed atop the Conference USA standings at 11-1. The team is now 20-3 in their last 23, and 17-2 in the last 19.
Quotable
Head Coach John McCormack:
“I told the team after the game, I thought this was one of our better wins. Coming off an extra-inning game, you’ve won the series, sometimes there’s a letdown. We did not get off to a good start, down five-nothing in the third, but they just kept grinding. Put up three, then six in the sixth, and Michael Schuler was really good, he kept us in the game, gave us an opportunity to score some runs. It was a great win, really proud of the guys to get a sweep on the road. (Charlotte’s) back was against the wall and they came out charging and we were able to withstand it and get a ‘W.’
The Turning Point
Charlotte (12-18-1, 3-8-1 C-USA) jumped out early, scoring twice in the first and adding three in the third. Meanwhile, the Owl bats were limited to just a walk through three, and the first hit didn’t come until the fourth. They chipped away at the deficit, making it 5-3 in the fifth in a six-hit frame, and then took the lead for good with six in the sixth.
The Finish
Michael Schuler came on in the third and limited the damage, then threw scoreless innings from the fourth through the seventh. In fact, Owl relievers in the series combined to throw 16 2/3 innings of no-run baseball. That included two frames by Vince Coletti to close out Sunday. He was buoyed by three more runs by the FAU offense in the ninth for the final margin.
The Arms
· Schuler (2-1) got the win in his longest outing as an Owl, 4 2/3 innings. Ten of the first 12 outs he recorded were flyouts, and he did not walk a batter
· In the eighth and the ninth, Coletti scattered four hits and like Schuler, also had one strikeout
The Bats
· The runs in the fifth came on singles by Eric Rivera, Mitchell Hartigan and Francisco Urbaez
· Gunnar Lambert cut it to one with sac fly in the sixth, and the tying run came in on another Rivera single
· Urbaez gave the Owls the lead, an error scored two more, and Pedro Pages singled in the final run of an 11-batter frame
· In the ninth, Jacob Josey doubled in two, with Rivera notching his third RBI on a fielder’s choice
· Four Owls had multi-hit games: Urbaez with three hits, and with two apiece, Rivera, Joe Montes and Wilfredo Alvarez
· Pages, Montes and Alvarez all scored two runs each
What’s Next
This upcoming weekend is a home series versus the streaking Louisiana Tech Bulldogs, winners of eight in a row. The series begins Friday, April 12, a 6:30 p.m. start. Get tickets 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.
