Luke McNeillie fired 3 1/3 shutout relief innings to earn the victory.
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Trailing by one run in the bottom of the ninth, Jac Caglianone<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/jac-caglianone/16365> produced a walk-off homer to secure a 4-3 victory and series win over No. 21 Mississippi State at Condron Family Ballpark on Sunday afternoon.
Florida (16-11, 6-3 SEC) has now won all six of its SEC contests in come-from-behind fashion, claiming a pair of games this past weekend via the walk-off. The Gators have secured 16-straight regular-season series at home while taking 16 of the program’s last 18 SEC series.
Caglianone (1-for-2) handled the honors on Sunday, walking three times while also launching the two-run blast to win it. The southpaw also excelled on the mound with 5 2/3 strong innings, but freshman Luke McNeillie<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/luke-mcneillie/16629> was the finale’s star hurler with 3 1/3 shutout frames to earn the victory.
The Gators and the Bulldogs (19-10, 4-5 SEC) faced off in an early pitchers’ duel, as Caglianone and Karson Ligon fired zeros in the first two innings. Caglianone blanked Mississippi State through the third while the Florida offense pushed a run across in the bottom half. Following back-to-back hit-by-pitches of Colby Shelton<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/colby-shelton/16639> and Caglianone, Shelton eventually raced home on a one-out wild pitch to open a 1-0 lead.
Caglianone no-hit the Bulldogs through four innings before they broke through in the fifth. Connor Hujsak ended the bid with a leadoff double to left-center, then scored on an RBI single to right off the bat of Bryce Chance to tie it at one run apiece.
Mississippi State grabbed a 3-1 lead in the sixth. With one out, David Mershon singled to center to plate Johnny Long followed by a bases-loaded walk of Aaron Downs.
McNeillie relieved Caglianone with two outs in the sixth and induced a lineout of Chance, aided by a diving catch in right-center by Ty Evans<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/ty-evans/16368>, to strand the bases loaded.
Florida drew within one run in the bottom of the sixth, beginning with a Luke Heyman<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/luke-heyman/16370> walk and Armando Albert<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/armando-albert/16619> hit-by-pitch. Tanner Garrison<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/tanner-garrison/16622> bunted the runners over, allowing Hayden Yost<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/hayden-yost/16633> to come through with a pinch-hit, RBI infield single to third base to cut the deficit to 3-2.
McNeillie threw a scoreless seventh inning, then worked around a one-out walk to send a 3-2 matchup into the bottom of the eighth. The freshman fired another zero in the ninth to give the Gators an opportunity to walk it off.
Trailing 3-2 in the bottom of the ninth, Florida needed just two batters to rally from behind to take the series. Evans was plunked to lead off the inning, bringing Caglianone to the plate. After working a 1-2 count, Caglianone unloaded for a game-winning, line-drive home run onto the right-field berm as the Gators stormed the field to celebrate a 4-3 victory.
McNeillie (3-3) earned the win on 3 1/3 shutout relief innings. The freshman allowed just two hits and struck out three.
Bulldogs reliever Evan Siary (0-2) was saddled with the loss, allowing two earned runs on three hits, one walk and four strikeouts.
Caglianone received a no-decision. The southpaw lasted 5 2/3 innings with three earned runs on three hits, four walks and five strikeouts.
MSU starter Karson Ligon did not factor into the decision. He allowed one earned run across 2 1/3 frames on one hit and three walks. He struck out one.
NOTABLES
* Sunday’s official attendance was 5,829.
* Florida delivered multiple walk-off wins in a series for the first time since March 7-9, 2014 vs. Connecticut.
* All three wins in that series were walk-offs.
* The Gators posted their eighth come-from-behind win of the season.
* All six of Florida’s SEC victories have been in come-from-behind fashion.
* Florida won its 16th-straight three-game, regular-season series at Condron Family Ballpark
* The Gators have won 16 of their last 18 SEC series dating back to 2022.
* Yost recorded his first-career RBI with an infield single in the sixth inning.
* Caglianone no-hit the Bulldogs across the first four innings.
* In his last five starts, Caglianone has allowed five earned runs across 30 innings on 13 hits, 20 walks and 37 strikeouts.
* McNeillie has now strung together four-straight scoreless outings spanning nine innings.
* Florida is 32-8 in home series and 47-14 at home overall since the start of the 2023 season.
* The Gators are 44-16 in weekend series since 2023 and 53-19 across the team’s previous 24 series.
* Florida is 43-19 in its last 62 games vs. SEC opponents including a 35-16 regular-season mark.
* Florida is now 72-53 all-time vs. Mississippi State including 34-24 at home.
* The Gators are 25-13 against the Bulldogs under head coach Kevin O’Sullivan<https://floridagators.com/sports/baseball/roster/coaches/kevin-o-sullivan/1752> (11-7 at home).
FROM HEAD COACH KEVIN O’SULLIVAN
On Caglianone and McNeillie’s performances on the mound…
“I mean, still trying to gather my thoughts. All those years, and nothing seems to be surprising at this point. Jac was really good on the mound. Obviously, five innings probably ran out of a little gas there, but competed. The continued growth that he’s been showing by pitching off the secondary pitches has been really, really good, and what can you say about Luke? We made our mind up that if we had gotten in trouble in the sixth, and then that’s what happened, that we would go to Luke right away. You know we’d been struggling offensively, so had an idea this might be a low-scoring game, not a normal Sunday game. So, he came in, he was really good. To make a couple of those pitches to Larry, their leadoff hitter with the runners in scoring position to keep it a one run game, was huge.”
On McNeillie’s progression…
“You’ve kind of seen it, this is four or five outings in a row he pitched good. You can’t emphasize enough the pitches that he made. I think he went 3-1 on Dakota Jordan and ended up striking him out in fastball counts. The ability to execute when I took the visit, because I knew how important that run was, that last run at the top of the ninth. They had their shortstop, who had a phenomenal weekend. I mean coming into today I think he saw 57 pitches over 10 at bats. That’s 5.7, you do the math, pitches per AB. We had walked him four times, he had a sac fly, a home run, he made highlight play after highlight play at short. What a good player. I knew with him coming up next that Larry had trouble seeing spin this weekend and that you are going to have to execute, because he’s probably going to be sitting on spin. So, just make sure you locate it down in the zone and when we get to two strikes, we’re going to have to bury it. So, for him to do that in that spot is huge, because obviously that was a huge, huge run. We give up another run and at this point when your offense is struggling a little bit, two runs feels like four.”
On Caglianone’s offspeed pitches improving…
“We just forced the issue early on in the first couple of starts. It kind of started as, okay which offspeed pitch is going to work today, the slider or the changeup? Probably the Miami start is when it was like okay, the change is a plus pitch. That was probably the start that I kind of figured out that he’s got the third pitch now. So, it was good. Like I said, I think he ran out of gas a little bit. It was good to at least have him have a start at 80 pitches, I think he threw. Not that that’s not a lot of pitches, but we didn’t have to stretch him to 100, 105 today.”
UP NEXT
Florida hosts Florida A&M on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. on SEC Network+.
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