FSU baseball blown out by Duke in ACC Championship Game
After a week of prolific success in Charlotte, Florida State baseball's ACC Tournament run came up just short of a conference championship.
And it ended on the wrong side of a blowout.
The fifth-seeded Seminoles (42-15) suffered a lopsided 16-4 loss to sixth-seeded Duke (39-18) in the ACC Championship Game Sunday afternoon at Truist Field in Charlotte.
The Blue Devils chased FSU starter Carson Dorsey after 1+ inning of work and combined to tag seven FSU pitchers on a depleted Seminoles staff for 16 runs on 16 hits to win their second ACC Championship in the last four years (2021).
The Seminoles took an early lead in the bottom of the first inning on a two-run home run from Cam Smith (his 14th of the year) to make it 2-0 FSU. However, Duke charged back with five runs in the second, four more in the fourth and five more in the sixth to turn a small early deficit into a commanding 14-4 lead.
After a scoreless first inning, Dorsey was pulled without recording an out in the second after allowing a pair of singles, a walk and a hit-by-pitch to bring in a run. Noah Short came out of the bullpen and allowed four more runs on a two-run double and a two-run bloop single.
Duke plated four runs in the fourth on a grand slam by Ben Miller off Yoel Tejeda Jr. and five more in the sixth including a grand slam by Devin Obee off Ben Barrett, who was making his first appearance since May 7.
While the Blue Devils' offense had quite a hit parade against FSU with most of the Seminoles' most reliable bullpen arms unavailable Sunday, the FSU pitches who were available didn't help themselves by issuing six walks and hitting two batters.
FSU had a few chances to hit its way back into the game before Duke really piled it on. But the Seminoles left two on base in the fifth, three in the sixth and two more in the seventh. FSU finished with eight runners left on base, two more than Duke's six even though the Blue Devils put far more runners on base.
FSU's only other runs Sunday came on Jaime Ferrer's 17th homer of the season, a two-run shot to left in the fourth inning.
Second baseman Drew Faurot, right fielder James Tibbs III and designated hitter Marco Dinges were named to the All-ACC-Tournament team as FSU's representatives.
While Sunday's loss is a sour ending to FSU's week in Charlotte, it's widely believed that the Seminoles did enough this week to earn a top-eight overall seed in the NCAA Tournament. FSU was projected as the No. 7 overall seed by D1Baseball and the No. 8 overall seed by Baseball America entering Sunday's game.
The NCAA will announce the list of 16 schools that will host regionals next weekend Sunday night at 8:30 p.m. on the NCAA Baseball Twitter/X account.
Then the entire NCAA Tournament field will be announced Monday at noon on ESPN2. That's when we'll find out if FSU has indeed earned a top-eight overall seed for the first time since 2018, also the last time FSU hosted a regional.
Follow The Osceola on Facebook
Follow The Osceola on Twitter
Subscribe to the Osceola's YouTube channel
Subscribe to the Osceola's podcasts on Apple