Baseball Drops Series Finale to USF, 7-5

Sunday, April 2

Greer Field at Turchin Stadium

1:00 p.m.

Tulane University

12-16, 0

USF

24-5, 0

USF

Tulane

Photo by: Parker Waters

Apr 2, 2017 | Baseball

Box Score

Box Score

NEW ORLEANS – Tulane was unable to recover from an early deficit, and dropped the third game of its American Athletic Conference series to No. 25 USF, 7-5, Sunday afternoon at Greer Field at Turchin Stadium.

The Bulls (24-5, 1-2 American) scored five unearned runs in the third inning, and added two in the fifth, after the Green Wave (12-16, 2-1 American) had cut it to 5-4. The Wave claimed the series with a 6-4 win Friday and a 4-3 victory on Saturday.

Hunter Williams was 2-for-4 with an RBI and a run scored, and Kobi Owen drove in two runs during Tulane's fourth-run fourth inning. Freshman Chase Solesky (1-1) took the loss in 4.0 innings in the start, while Ryan Valdes (5-0) pitched 3.1 innings and earned the win for USF.

"We got down, but you can see by the way our players are fighting and believing, and the way we're trending, I think the believability is starting to pick up," Tulane head coach Travis Jewett said. "I think they thought we were still going to win, but (USF) did a good job. That's a good South Florida team. I told the players, even though we're disappointed today, you did win a series against a team that came in here 23-3. We made some mistakes, and they took advantage of it."

USF got two runners on in the first, but a lineout to left field ended the threat, and Solesky sat down the Bulls in order in the second. In the third, an error led off the inning, and the Bulls scored five runs on four hits, including a three-run double by David Villar and a run-scoring double by Andres Leal.

After recording just one single prior to the fourth inning, the Green Wave exploded for four runs, also aided by an error. Williams reached on a fielding miscue at third and Jarret DeHart walked, setting up RBI singles by Sal Gozzo and Kody Hoese. Owen followed with a two-run double deep into the right field corner, cutting the deficit to 5-4.

A two-run home run in the top of the fifth by Joe Genord extended the USF lead to 5-4. The Wave got a run back when Paul Gozzo singled and Grant Witherspoon reached on a fielder's choice, then Williams poked an RBI single up the middle to make the score 7-5.

The Wave threatened in the eighth when Williams lined a leadoff double down the left field line, but were unable to push the run across. USF threatened again in the seventh on a two-out double to right center, but Owen and Willsey executed a perfect relay to Paul Gozzo at the plate and retire Leal trying to score from first.

The Green Wave is on the road this week, with a contest at crosstown foe UNO at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at Maestri Field, then a conference series at Cincinnati April 7-9.

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USF 7, Tulane 5 (Apr 02, 2017 at New Orleans, La.)
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USF................. 005 020 000 - 7 11 1 (24-5, 1-2)
Tulane.............. 000 410 000 - 5 8 1 (12-16, 2-1)
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Pitchers: USF - STRZELECKI, Peter; VALDES, Ryan(4); PEREZ, Andrew(8) and LEAL, Andres. Tulane -
SOLESKY, Chase; BJORNGJELD, Sam(5); ISSA, Brandon(8); COLLETTI, Christian(9) and GOZZO, Paul.
Win-VALDES, Ryan(5-0) Save-PEREZ, Andrew(4) Loss-SOLESKY, Chase(1-1) T-2:45 A-1702
HR USF - GENORD, Joe (5).
Weather: 78 Cloudy, Wind SE @ 14 mph
SOLESKY faced 2 batters in the 5th.
VALDES faced 1 batter in the 8th.