Miami Hurricanes coach J.D. Arteaga talks to players before the Hurricanes baseball season opener against the Lehigh Mountain Hawks at Mark Light Field in Coral Gables, Florida, Florida on Friday, February 13, 2026
PHOTO BY AL DIAZ
adiaz@miamiherald.com
The Miami Hurricanes’ Ryan Bilka appeared to get out of a bases-loaded, no-out jam in the seventh inning of a tied rivalry game against the Florida Gators on Saturday. The Hurricanes reliever struck out consecutive batters and then watched as Michael Torres hauled in a long Brendan Lawson fly ball in deep center field. Miami’s dugout erupted in celebration.
Except… the out didn’t happen.
Third-base umpire Travis Carlson called a balk.
Cash Strayer trotted home from third base as a result, giving UF the go-ahead run.
The Gators held on from there as No. 10 UF beat the No. 17 Hurricanes 8-4 at Mark Light Field to take the weekend series.
Miami (10-2) lost the first game of the series 7-2 on Friday to Florida (11-1). It’s the fifth consecutive year UF has won the series and the 11th time in the past 12 series dating back to the 2015 season.
Both Hurricanes coach J.D. Arteaga and catcher Alex Sosa declined to comment on the balk call postgame (Bilka was not made available).
“The boys fought hard,” Sosa said. “Everybody came in and did their job. Just keep competing. Control what you can control.”
Hurricanes senior left-handed pitcher Rob Evans struck out a career-high 12 over six-plus innings of work. He ran into trouble early, giving up four runs in the second inning before going on to retire 13 consecutive batters — eight by strikeout — to get through the sixth inning.
Evans’ night ended after a hit by pitch and walk to start the seventh inning, giving way to Bilka out of the bullpen to try to get out of the jam. Bilka walked the first batter he faced to load the bases before almost getting out of the jam. He struck out Jacob Kendall and Kyle Jones swinging and then appeared to get Lawson to fly out before the balk call that brought a run home.
Miami opened scoring on a Derek Williams three-run home run to left-center field in the first inning off UF starter Aidan King, who exited after 2 1/3 innings due to injury. UM then tied the game at 4-4 in the fifth on a shallow Daniel Cuvet sacrifice fly that scored Torres, who doubled and moved to third on a wild pitch.
UF then took the lead for good on the balk and then padded its lead in the ninth on an Ethan Surowiec three-run home run to left-center off Bilka.
“We had a chance,” Arteaga said. “We had a chance to the very end there. We kind of put all our marbles in there and went all in with Bilka, and then try to keep it [close]. Stretched him out [knowing] we’re gonna lose him for tomorrow, but we went for it there. He almost got out of that one inning, and hung a split finger there [in the ninth] and they got the three-run home run. So that’s what it is.”
The series finale is at 1 p.m. Sunday. The game will be streamed on ACC Network Xtra.
This story was originally published February 28, 2026 at 9:43 PM.
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Miami Herald
Jordan McPherson covers the Miami Hurricanes and Florida Panthers for the Miami Herald. He attended the University of Florida and covered the Gators athletic program for five years before joining the Herald staff in December 2017.