They don\u2019t ask how; they ask whether or not you did.<\/p>\n
Florida State baseball took the hard way on Sunday night, but the Seminoles survived and defeated Northern Illinois 7-4 in 10 innings to advance to the regional final tomorrow against St. John\u2019s.<\/p>\n
FSU trailed 4-3 after seven innings and seemed to be falling apart, with three errors in the field and multiple mistakes on the base paths. But this team never gives up, and Florida State found a way to push the game to extras before opening the game up in the tenth.<\/p>\n
As the offense peaked and valleyed, the Nole bullpen, as it has been for most of the season, allowed their team to stay in the game. Although Cooper Whited only went 3 1\/3 IP, Chris Knier and Brodie Purcell combined for 6.2 innings, 12 strikeouts, and only one unearned run, to give Florida State a chance. Both righty relievers posted career highs in strikeouts and threw their most pitches of the season as they left it all on the field and helped carry the Seminoles into the regional final.<\/p>\n
The two sides traded blows to start Sunday night\u2019s game. Florida State took an early lead on an RBI double by Brody DeLamielleure, who traded places with John Stuetzer, who had begun the inning with a double of his own. However, in the bottom half, NIU pushed out in front 2-1, as an error by Gabe Fraser and a two-run homer put the Huskies ahead.<\/p>\n
Florida State responded right back in its next turn at the plate. Ben Barrett roped a single up the middle and went first to third courtesy of a base knock from Fraser. In the ensuing at-bat, Carter McCulley\u2019s swinging bunt allowed Barrett to score, and with two outs, Stuetzer\u2019s second hit of the day brought in Fraser, as the Noles went back in front, 3-2.<\/p>\n
Whited settled the game down for Link Jarrett\u2019s side on the mound with a scoreless second and third, but it came at a cost. The lefty fired 63 pitches through three innings, with only three strikeouts and no walks, as Northern Illinois turned every at-bat into a battle.<\/p>\n
Momentum went away from Florida State in the fourth. With Fraser on first and McCulley at the plate, the second baseman swung at ball four while Fraser was in motion, resulting in a strike-\u2019em-out-throw-\u2018em-out to end the inning. In the first at-bat in the Huskie half of the fourth, Gavin Baldwin drove his second home run of the day out to right field, tying the game at three. After Whited recorded the first out of the inning, he walked a batter, and Jarrett decided to make a move, inserting Chris Knier.<\/p>\n
The Seminoles certainly would have preferred more than 3 1\/3 IP from Whited, but he struggled to miss bats and record easy, quick outs. It seemed like things were about to go from bad to worse for FSU as Dowd lost a lazy fly ball in the lights that dropped in for a single, but the center fielder made up for it as he made a diving grab and fired the ball into the infield quickly to double off the runner and extinguish the threat.<\/p>\n
After a quiet fifth, the Noles had a chance to reclaim the lead in the sixth. Barrett doubled with two outs, and Fraser was hit by a pitch, but McCulley took an obvious strike three that left the runners on, a common trend for this FSU team. Florida State squandered another opportunity in the seventh as a hit-and-run backfired for the second occasion, this time, it was Stuetzer getting doubled off after Dowd popped out on a high pitch that could have been ball four. At the worst possible time, the Seminole offense began to revert to its worst version.<\/p>\n
Just as the offensive mistakes started to stack up, FSU\u2019s defense began to let them down as well. What seemed like a routine double play in the seventh ended with both runners safe when Fraser\u2019s throw to second pulled McCulley off the bag. In the ensuing at-bat, Knier mishandled a bunt, allowing the NIU catcher to reach first to load the bases with nobody out. Even though the Seminoles seemed on the cusp of getting out of the jam as Barrett snagged a line drive and doubled off the runner at first, Knier started to run out of steam. The righty hit the second batter he faced before walking in a run, as Florida State fell behind 4-3 with only six outs left in its season.<\/p>\n
Although poor defense is a feature, not a bug, of this team, so too is their fight, and the Noles did not go down easy. In the eighth, Hunter Carns walked, and Nathan Cmeyla lined a double into the left-center gap, scoring Carns all the way from first as part of a hit-and-run to tie the game at four. Purcell stayed in for the bottom of the eighth and punched out the side. He found trouble in the ninth as the winning run reached second, but the former USC transfer struck out NIU\u2019s lead-off hitter to send the game to extra innings. The bullpen did its job today, as Knier and Purcell looked like their best selves.<\/p>\n
Brayden Dowd began extra innings with a walk, and Brody DeLamielleure singled, allowing Dowd to go first to third and put runners on the corners with nobody out. In the ensuing plate appearance, Hunter Carns drove in Dowd to give FSU a 5-4 lead. However, the Noles were not done. With two outs and a runner on first, Ben Barrett smashed a two-run home run to the opposite field, extending the FSU advantage to 7-4 and putting the game out of reach. The offense scuffled for long stretches during the battle against NIU, including going scoreless from the third to the seventh, but five extra-base hits, such as Barrett\u2019s bomb, gave Florida State enough punch when they made it count.<\/p>\n
As for tomorrow\u2019s schedule, Florida State will have to win two games in a doubleheader, starting with an afternoon contest, to advance from its own regional. It will certainly be a challenge with multiple arms spent, including all three tonight, but this group always seems to pull a rabbit out of the hat when they need it most.<\/p>\n
2026 Tallahassee Regional: Schedule<\/p>\n
Game 6: No. 4 St. John\u2019s vs. No. 1 Florida State<\/p>\n
Time: 12 p.m.Channel: TBA<\/p>\n
Game 7: No. 1 Florida State vs. No. 4 St. John\u2019s (if necessary)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"They don\u2019t ask how; they ask whether or not you did. Florida State baseball took the hard way…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":291364,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[71160,232,234,233],"class_list":["post-291363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tallahassee","tag-florida-state-baseball","tag-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee-headlines","tag-tallahassee-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=291363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291363\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/291364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=291363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=291363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=291363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}