Florida defeats LSU to claim its first College World Series title.
OMAHA, Neb. — Maybe this wasn’t Florida coach Kevin O’Sullivan’s best team. It is, however, his first national championship team.
The Gators scored four runs in the eighth inning to pull away from LSU and beat their Southeastern Conference rival 6-1 Tuesday night to complete a twogame sweep in the College World Series finals for the baseball program’s first national title.
Florida (52-19) posted the eighth sweep in the 15 years of the best-of-three finals format, and first since 2013. LSU (52-20) lost for the first time in seven appearances in a championship game.
“Just a gritty group, that’s all I can say,” said O’Sullivan, the 10th-year coach who had brought the Gators to Omaha six of the last eight years. “There are other teams that may be bigger and stronger — our starting pitching has carried us the whole year — but we got some timely hits.”
Florida was in the CWS for the 11th time and previously had made it to the finals in 2005 and 2011, getting swept each time.
“They’re a very deserving national champion,” LSU coach Paul Mainieri said. “I’m happy for Kevin. He works hard, and he has had several teams that maybe were even better than this team and sat up here as disappointed as I am right now. Finally got his championship.”
Freshman Tyler Dyson (4-0) limited the Tigers to three hits in six innings in only his second start, and the Gators capitalized on LSU errors in the first and second innings to go up 2-0 against Jared Poche (12-4).
Things got interesting after Michael Byrne relieved Dyson in the seventh. LSU pulled to 2-1 and would have tied it if not for Jake Slaughter being called for runner interference at second base for sliding into shortstop Dalton Guthrie’s leg as he was throwing to first to turn a double play. Josh Smith, who had run home, was sent back to third, and Beau Jordan flew out to end the inning.
The Gators scored four times in the bottom of the eighth. LSU reliever Zack Hess hit a batter with the bases loaded, Deacon Liput hit a two-run single and JJ Schwarz had a sacrifice fly.
“I don’t think anybody thought we would get to this point,” O’Sullivan said. “We had our struggles throughout the year offensively. In mid-March we were hitting about .230 as a team.”