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Thursday, March 28, 2024
Softball

The Gators softball team will face Georgia at 7 p.m. on Thursday.

The Florida Gators (55-9) arrived in Oklahoma City as the No. 2 overall seed and the favorite in their Women’s College World Series bracket to advance to the championship round.

However, familiar foes and a National Player of the Year stand in their path.

UF has Georgia, Florida State and UCLA in its double-elimination bracket. It’s a combined 2-3 this season against the Bulldogs and the Seminoles and hasn’t taken the field opposite of the Bruins since March 2017.

Here’s a look under the microscope at the other teams in the Gators’ WCWS bracket.

 

Georgia Bulldogs (48-11)

UGA enters its program’s fourth World Series as the seventh seed of eight teams but brings plenty of momentum with it.

The Bulldogs advanced to the WCWS on a game-winning home run by senior Cortni Emanuel against the then-No. 7 Tennessee Volunteers. Emanuel is batting .437 this season in the leadoff spot and has totaled 90 hits so far.

She is joined in the Georgia lineup by six others hitting above .330 on the season, including junior Alyssa DiCarlo.

The shortstop has posted a .392 average with 20 home runs and is slugging .835, over 50 percentage points higher than Florida’s closest batter, National Player of the Year finalist Amanda Lorenz (.784).

Yet, UGA will be without its best pitcher, senior Brittany Gray, who suffered a season-ending bicep injury on April 9. Sophomore Mary Wilson Avant and junior Kylie Bass have filled in nicely in Gray’s absence. The Georgia starting pitchers are 12-3 and 15-3 in 2018, respectively.

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The Bulldogs and the Gators will meet in the first matchup of the bracket, which begins at 7 tonight at the ASA Softball Hall of Fame Stadium and will be on ESPN2.

 

Florida State Seminoles (52-11)

FSU was nearly eliminated from play in its Super Regional against LSU. After losing the first game of double-elimination play, the Seminoles outlasted the Tigers in an 11-inning thriller to send the series to a third game. Florida State ace Kylee Hanson took the circle in the rubber match and shut down the LSU offense, allowing only five hits and one run over the full seven innings to send FSU to its 10th WCWS.

Hanson and fellow starting pitcher Meghan King have been putting up clutch performances all campaign. Hanson is 28-5 with an impressive 1.05 ERA and a 5.7 strikeout-to-walk ratio. King is not far behind, posting a 22-6 record to go along with a 1.37 ERA. The two pitchers have combined for 24 complete games.

Offensively, Florida State is powered by its third baseman, senior Jessie Warren. She has 19 home runs beside her team-leading .386 average. Warren also knocked in eight of FSU’s 16 runs in the Super series against LSU.

The Seminoles are 2-2 against WCWS competition this season, splitting games with top-two seeds Oregon and Florida.  

 

UCLA Bruins (56-5)

The Bruins enter Oklahoma City searching for their 13th WCWS title. Not only do they boast the most championships of any program, but they also have the USA Softball Collegiate Player of the Year in Rachel Garcia.

Garcia is an effective pitcher and batter. In the circle, she leads UCLA with a 27-3 record and a 1.02 ERA. She’s efficient as well, compiling 273 strikeouts compared to only 39 walks in 2018.

Garcia also holds the fifth-best batting average on the team (.356) and the second most home runs (11).

The Bruins’ offense contains four batters above the .380 clip, including redshirt freshman Aaliyah Jordan, who’s hitting .434 and a squad-best 12 home runs and 66 RBIs, and sophomore Bubba Nickles, who’s batting .405 in the bottom-half of the lineup.

UCLA is 6-3 this season against WCWS competition. Its only series loss came against first-overall seed Oregon. The Bruins will face off with FSU at 9:30 tonight at ASA Softball Hall of Fame Stadium, and the game will be televised on ESPN2.

You can follow Mark Stine on Twitter @mstinejr or contact him at mstine@alligator.org.

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