No. 4 seed Alabama baseball was unable to keep up with the offensive explosion of the No. 5 seed Florida Gators, resulting in an early exit of the SEC Tournament.
Just two months after Alabama right-hander Tyler Fay baffled the Gators with a historic, 131-pitch no-hitter in Tuscaloosa, Florida brought the heavy artillery to the SEC Tournament quarterfinals. In a game moved up to Thursday afternoon due to impending inclement weather, the No. 5 seed Gators got revenge, punishing the No. 4 seed Crimson Tide in a 13-3, eight-inning run-rule blowout at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium.
Both starting pitchers were having ideal starts on the mound for their respective teams until the fourth inning, when things started to go south for Fay. The Gators hit two solo shots off of Fay in their half of the fourth inning and never looked back. Florida added five more in the fifth and four in the seventh to extend their lead to 10 runs.
Facing a run-rule defeat, Alabama’s Brady Neal hit a two-run home run in the bottom of the seventh to delay the loss. In the following inning, Florida tacked on two more runs to defeat the Crimson Tide in the eighth by run-rule.
Fay suffered his fourth loss of the season, allowing five runs on six hits in 4.2 innings of work.
Justin Lebron and Brennan Holt both had 2-for-4 days at the dish while Neal was responsible for driving in all three of the Crimson Tide’s runs on the afternoon.
Alabama has improved each year under Rob Vaughn, but is now 1-3 in the SEC Tournament in his three years as head coach.
The Crimson Tide will await their seeding in the NCAA baseball tournament that will begin next weekend. Alabama is positioned to at least host a regional. Going into the Florida game, the Tide were projected to be a top-8 national seed, which would also make them a Super Regional host.
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