The
Seawolves (52-14) face off against Florida State (48-16) Sunday evening
in a must-win game if Stony Brook wants to extend its stay in Omaha.
Both teams fell to the losers' bracket after losses on Friday, including
Stony Brook's 9-1 loss to No. 2 overall seed UCLA.
Sunday's
game doesn't get any easier after facing UCLA on Friday -- the
Seminoles are the No. 3 overall seed in this year's NCAA bracket and has
breezed through the tournament up until Friday. Florida State won three
straight games in the Regional, and then swept Stanford in the Super
Regional, which included a 17-1 shellacking of arguably the nation's top
pitcher in Mark Appel.
The Orlando Sentinel, Omaha.com, Newsday and ESPN.com all have previews of Sunday's match up.
"Florida State has kind of had their way with everybody in the
tournament so far. We're both in the same position . It's a position
we've been in before. We'll be ready to go," Head Coach Matt Senk told Newsday's Greg Logan.
While Brandon McNitt will take the mound for the Seawolves, Florida State will throw Mike Compton, a freshman All-American who has a team-best 11-2 record and a 2.86 ERA. Compton will be throwing 87-89 MPH sinker, as well as a decent slider.
The Seminoles also have the ACC Player of the Year roaming center field in senior James Ramsey. Says one scouting report on Ramsey in Baseball America, "Ramsey's a plus defender in the outfield, probably an average thrower. He has unbelievable hand-eye coordination, he can get fooled but still gets the barrel on the ball. The one thing that will shock you is the dude can really fly."
Sounds like Florida State's version of Travis Jankowski, no?
And as we talked about on Friday, the Seawolves are getting an enormous amount of support from the local Omahans. There is another group with a huge amount of respect for Stony Brook -- LSU fans. As they do every year, even when the Tigers are not in the College World Series, LSU fans flock to Omaha for the tournament. This year, they have adopted the Seawolves as their team after they watched the program convincingly beat their Tigers in Baton Rouge.
It hasn't been an unusual sight to see a fan with a red Stony Brook shirt and a purple LSU hat walking down the streets. Earlier this week, one LSU fan stopped a pair of Seawolves' fans on the sidewalk to show them a picture on his camera phone of his tank top with the "LSU" letters crossed out and "Stony Brook" hand-written below. He then made sure to send his best wishes and support.
Stony Brook Athletic Director Jim Fiore recently went on Bayou Bengals Insider Sports Talk to discuss his baseball program and being at the College World Series. The Baton Rouge community just can't get enough of the Seawolves.
Here are some more media links as we head into Sunday night's game. And Happy Father's Day!
The New York Post: Stony Brook refuses to quit with do-or-die game looming
