CARY, N.C. – Top-seeded Florida Southern College survived elimination from the 2018 Division II Baseball Championship for the second straight day on Thursday, edging undefeated and No. 2 seed Columbus State University, 3-2.

 

The championship is being held at the USA Baseball National Training Complex, and is being co-hosted by the Town of Cary and the University of Mount Olive.

 

The Moccasins (45-10-1) broke a 1-1 tie in the bottom of the fourth, scoring a pair of runs set up by a leadoff double from Omar Villaman and walk from Hayden

Marze. Villaman eventually scored on a passed ball to give FSC the lead, and Marze crossed home on a sacrifice fly off the bat of Alex Goebel.

 

Villaman, a senior from St. Cloud, Fla., had three hits in the contest, one day after producing four hits in Florida Southern’s 7-4 victory over Texas A&M-Kingsville on Wednesday afternoon.

 

The Mocs also received three hits from leadoff hitter Cody Burgess. Together, Villaman and Burgess accounted for six of the nine total hits off Columbus State’s T.J. Clark.

 

Clark (7-4) tossed a complete game for the Cougars (47-14). The junior from Mableton, Ga., gave up just two earned runs, walked one and struck out six.

 

After surrendering an RBI single to Villaman in the first and the two runs in the fourth, Clark allowed just one more runner to reach second base in the contest.

 

However, Columbus State could not come up with a game-tying or go-ahead hit against Florida Southern starter Logan Browning and two relievers.

Browning (11-2), who produced his second outstanding pitching start of the championship, scattered seven hits and a pair of runs while walking one and striking out 11.

 

The Cougars got on the board against Browning in the fourth on an RBI single by Frank Wager, but Browning used a strikeout to end the inning and strand two more runners.

 

After falling behind 3-1 in the fourth, CSU bounced back with a run in the fifth on an RBI single by Mason McClellan, who led the Cougars with a pair of hits.

 

Columbus State had an opportunity to take the lead after getting a runner to third on an error, but Browning struck out a pair of batters to strand a pair.

 

Cole Crowder worked two innings of relief for Florida Southern, giving up one hit, walking two and striking out two. Crowder faced adversity in the eighth, giving up the hit and the two walks to load the bases with one out, but recorded a strikeout and flyball out to end the threat.

 

Mike Palaez worked a perfect ninth, retiring the Cougars in order on just nine pitches, to finish off the victory and collect his second save of the year.

 

The Florida Southern win forces a rematch with Columbus State on Friday. The winner will advance to the championship game(s) on Saturday.

 

 

 

“It was a great game all around. Both teams swung the bat well, both teams pitched well. We had Logan coming back on short rest. When he pitches, we expect that he’s going to keep us in the game. And once again, he did that.”

 

(On Browning pitching again during the tournament) “We’ll have to talk to him about it. It’s a difficult process. You have someone who has a chance to play at the next level. You want to win, but you also want to have their best interest in mind. I don’t want to do anything to put him in bad spot, but if he’s out there and says, ‘give me the ball’ and I see it in his eyes, he’ll probably get it.”

 

“When you’re on a hot streak, game-by-game you see the ball good. The ball starts to find holes. Hopefully I can keep it going for the team.”

 

“(Scoring first) is really big. It keeps our energy up in the dugout, keeps our guys up. I’m sure it puts the other team down, puts more pressure on them.”

 

 

“(Columbus State) has a lot of lefties in their lineup, so I knew I’d have to have the slider on today. I worked on it a lot in the pen. The change-up was a little off, but I had the slider working, so it worked out.”

 

“In the third and fourth innings, it was hot and I was feeling a little fatigued, but then I settled in during the fifth and sixth innings and felt pretty good. I was kind of mad when I came out after the sixth, but once I knew the pitch count, I understood.”

 

 

 

“It was a tight ball game. Us not putting the ball in play a couple of times when we had runners at third was the difference in the game. They got the sac fly and we didn’t. Their pitchers did a great job and kind of cancelled out our left-handed hitting. I think that was the story of the game.”

 

“T.J. threw a good game, kept us in it and gave us a chance to win it. We just didn’t do it with the sticks today.”

(On whether team lacked urgency) “No, I don’t think so. We went out there and played as hard as we could, and we were trying to win it. Their pitchers did a good job, and we just didn’t get the job done offensively. But we were doing everything we could to win the ball game, and we’ll do the same tomorrow.”

 

 

“It was a big stage out there. I was good when I settled in. I didn’t have my best stuff, but I feel like they capitalized on my mistakes. I started to get my fastball down, get my slider working.”

 

 

“Our whole lineup wasn’t seeing the ball, staying back, staying up the middle. We just didn’t get a big hit when we needed it. Their starter was mixing his pitches, keeping us off-balance, keeping us guessing.”

 

“I don’t think we ever thought we were out of the game. It was one run. We’ve gotten one run in a lot of innings in a lot of games.”