Florida State vs Vanderbilt - NCAA Super Regionals Game 1 Recap

Florida State 9, Vanderbilt 8 - FSU leads series, 1-0

Three different games were played on Friday afternoon at Dick Howser Stadium in Tallahassee, Florida. The Florida State Seminoles won a majority of them. Now they hope that their NCAA Super Regional series will acquire the very same pattern.

In this best-of-three pressure cooker, the object is to win twice and advance to America's Heartland for the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska. Florida State won't get credit for two wins after topping the Vanderbilt Commodores in an edge-of-your-seat thriller, but coach Mike Martin's team really did eclipse its SEC opponent in two of three situationally specific skirmishes.

The first game-within-the-game encompassed the opening three innings, as Florida State bolted to a 6-0 lead. The Seminoles took advantage of Vandy starter Taylor Hill, who struggled with his location, got behind on counts, and then aimed batting-practice fastballs up in the strike zone. James Ramsey smacked an RBI single in the first to get the Seminoles on the board, and after Sherman Johnson walloped a two-run homer in the bottom of the second, the Noles owned a six-run bulge. With FSU starter Sean Gilmartin dancing out of a bases-loaded jam in the third and executing his pitches in tight spots, the Seminoles led 6-1 after four innings and appeared to be in control.

Then came the second game, the next two and a half innings. Vanderbilt got off the deck and changed the contours of this contest, which fit the paradigm of a typical college baseball banger.

Unlike the big leagues, NCAA-style hardball is more of an offense-first competition. The aluminum bats used in scholastic baseball cause ground balls to scoot through the infield and shoot out of small parks. Pitchers can and will make good pitches at the collegiate level and yet still give up hits. This was the case in the fifth inning, as Vanderbilt hitters were able to go down in the strike zone and dig out the quality pitches Gilmartin threw. VU's Jason Esposito worked a count and smacked a two-run double in the fifth on a well-located Gilmartin fastball to shave FSU's lead to 6-3. One batter later, Curt Casali got one of those aluminum-propelled ground ball hits, a double just inside the third-base line that scored Esposito and made the score 6-4.

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In the sixth, Vandy kept coming against FSU reliever Geoff Parker. Joe Loftus took advantage of the cozy confines at Howser Stadium, slugging a home run to pull the Dores within a single run. When VU's Anthony Gomez then hit an RBI single, the game was tied at 6, and when Esposito then opened the seventh with another long ball off Parker, the visitors from Nashville had acquired a 7-6 advantage. The flow of this game's forces had shifted to the team from the state of Tennessee.

Then came the final mini-episode of this three-stage thriller. Sticks and stones might break people's bones, but they also crushed Commodore hearts on Friday.

"Sticks," at least in this case, don't just refer to baseball bats, but also to the box score which unfolded in the final two and a half innings. Whereas the first several frames in Dores-Noles featured crooked numbers, the final few stanzas in this showdown witnessed a bunch of 1-spots, with Florida State winning the fray.

After Vandy's seven consecutive runs gave the Dores the lead, Florida State posted some "sticks" courtesy of the "stones" shown by its mentally tough lineup.

FSU's Ramsey, who failed to make a catch on a ball in the sixth inning and thereby cost his team a run, atoned for his mistake in the bottom of the seventh by driving in a run with a sacrifice fly. The run-producing out occurred just after Vandy reliever Richie Goodenow threw a wild pitch that moved FSU baserunner Mike McGee to third.

In the eighth inning, the sticks and stones continued to emerge. Vandy's Mike Yastrzemski unloaded a solo homer in the top of the frame off the gopher-ball-plagued Parker, who exited immediately after giving up his third big fly of the day. However, FSU's Jayce Boyd was up to the task in the bottom of the eighth. He uncorked a long ball off VU's Chase Reid (4-2) to knot things up at 8-8.

In the ninth, the last, best blast belonged to the Noles, whose middle-inning failure got wiped away by a late-inning display of fortitude. McGee went yard off Reid with two outs to give Florida State a walk-off win. If FSU had not been able to recover after squandering a 6-0 lead, the Noles' chances of escaping this super regional intact would have been very minimal. However, because McGee muscled up and winning pitcher Daniel Bennett (5-1) pitched two scoreless innings to shore up the Seminole bullpen, Mike Martin's team now enjoys an advantage heading into Saturday's Game 2.

This series has the feel of a rollercoaster ride that won't end without a considerable amount of drama. Thankfully for Florida State, some late-inning lightning emerged precisely when Vanderbilt stood within five outs of victory in the bottom of the eighth.

By: Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Senior Staff Writer