Chants bounce back with big win over No. 9 Florida State

Through the first two games of Coastal Carolina’s weekend baseball series at Florida State, the Chanticleers simply couldn’t keep the Seminoles off the scoreboard.

Florida State had racked up 24 runs and 26 hits while cruising to a pair of lopsided wins to open the three-game set.

But a pair of rookie pitchers changed the narrative Sunday for the Chants.

Freshmen Shane Sawczak and Bobby Holmes combined to allow only two hits and two runs in the series finale while leading Coastal Carolina to a 4-2 win over the No. 9-ranked Seminoles at Dick Howser Stadium in Tallahassee, Fla.

“I have to check the record books, but I honestly don’t think we’ve ever beaten FSU in baseball,” Chants coach Gary Gilmore said by phone Sunday evening. “It was a huge win. To get spanked around like we did the first two games and be able to respond back today was a huge thing because we’ve had our own issues on Sundays.”

Gilmore is correct – Coastal Carolina was 0-13 all time against Florida State entering play Sunday.

And not only did the Chants (32-15) make some program history with the win while salvaging the series to a degree, they also added another significant victory to their season resume.

Florida State (35-14) came into the series No. 6 in the NCAA Division I RPI rankings while Coastal Carolina was No. 24.

“We’re still trying to get an at-large bid and a big win against a [high] RPI, nationally-ranked team helps that a lot,” Holmes said by phone.

The rookie right-hander was a big part of that.

Sawczak made the start and the lefty was nearly perfect through three scoreless innings before running into trouble in the bottom of the fourth. He gave up a leadoff single to Josh Delph and a double to John Sansone and then allowed Delph to score on a balk while Sansone scored on a passed ball to cut Coastal Carolina’s lead to 3-2.

That’s when Holmes came in and took over – literally and figuratively, that is.

With an inherited runner on first (and then second after another passed ball), Holmes managed to work out of the jam without any more runs scoring. And that’s how it would be the rest of the game for the Seminoles.

Holmes didn’t allow a hit or run while pitching a career-high six innings. He did issue one walk in each of his last four innings, but stranded each of those baserunners while moving to 4-0 for the season and lowering his earned-run average to a sterling 1.22 over 44 1/3 innings.

“That was big for the team more importantly, but a big confidence booster for myself,” Holmes said. “I have had some good appearances against some other big schools, but it was good to keep that rolling. …

“I don’t think I was intimidated by the Florida State jersey at all. I felt good in the ’pen. I’ve felt good all week. Nothing special, I just felt good out there.”

Offensively, sophomore G.K. Young was 3-for-4 with a run scored and an RBI and junior Anthony Marks was 3-for-5 with a run for Coastal Carolina.

The Chants scored three runs in the top of the third inning when junior Tyler Chadwick led off with a double and then came around to score as the Seminoles committed a throwing error on freshman Seth Lancaster’s sacrifice bunt.

Marks reached base on a bunt single and sophomore Michael Paez followed with a safety squeeze bunt to plate the second run. Two batters later, Young delivered an RBI single to make it 3-0.

Young then got things started again in the sixth inning with his third hit of the day and Florida State’s Dylan Silva followed by issuing three straight walks to juniors Zach Remillard, Casey Schroeder and David Parrett to score Young and make it 4-2.

The Chants closed out the win with another highlight in the bottom of the ninth when freshman centerfielder Billy Cooke tracked down a deep fly ball in the gap with a runner on base to thwart any thoughts of a comeback.

Overall, Gilmore said there’s plenty from the series he plans to address with his team this week, but the ending was nice.

“We’ve got a whole list of things on Wednesday and Thursday to work on in practice that they exploited against us that other people haven’t done,” Gilmore said. “We’ve got some things to cover to tighten up shop a little bit.

“But G.K. Young had a big day at the plate, Billy Cooke looked like [former Chants standout] Rico Noel in center field running that last ball down. I thought it was for sure a double off the wall and all heck was about to break loose, and all of a sudden you see him streaking across there. That was a heck of a play.”

And, for that matter, a heck of a win for a team trying to secure its place in the NCAA regionals.

This story was originally published May 3, 2015 at 7:03 PM with the headline "Chants bounce back with big win over No. 9 Florida State."