Florida State pitcher Luke Weaver turned in a career day, striking out 14 Troy batters, as Florida State cruised to an 11-0 win in the winner’s bracket game of the Tallahassee regional Saturday afternoon.

The Seminoles (46-15) scored three runs in the fifth inning, one each in the sixth and eighth and blew the game open with a six-run ninth. Despite the impressive numbers put up by the FSU offense, the day belonged to Weaver.

Troy head coach Bobby Pierce was impressed by the

“His fastball was really jumping on us, and we never really adjusted to it,” Pierce said. “He hid the ball well, had good velocity and controlled it well. We never really could get much stirring in any inning.”

In addition to the 14 strikeouts, Weaver didn’t walk a batter and scattered just four hits in eight innings of work. Troy pitcher Tanner Hicks, who had a good day on the mound as well, said Weaver was in the zone and had his stuff working today.

“I shook his hand after the game and told him that he pitched a great game,” said Hicks. “All the credit to him. He had his fastball working today on the outer half of the plate, 91-93. That is a tough pitch to hit, and he just had really good command.”

One of Troy’s four hits, may have affected the Trojans (41-19) chances to advance out of the regional round. In the fourth inning, Josh McDorman doubled off the wall in left center, and first basemen Trae Santos got wave from first to try to snag an early run.

 

Santos and Florida State catcher Seth McGee collided up the third base line for the final out of the inning. Santos came up lightly after the play, and took a few moments to head back to the field on defense.

Later in the game, in the sixth inning, Santos came out of the game and walked gingerly to the dugout. Pierce said that Santos aggravated a hamstring injury from earlier in the season, and is “kind of doubtful” for Sunday’s game.

“He’s had this earlier in the season and they were able to wrap him up good enough to get him in there to play,” Pierce said. “But that was a couple of days after it happened. I don’t know how bad he tweaked it yet; I just got him out for safety precautions.”

Pierce also said that he is unsure who will take the mound for the Trojans against Alabama tomorrow in an elimination game.

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First pitch for the elimination game is set for 11 a.m. CST. The winner of the game advances to the finals versus Florida State.

“Baseball players have been doing this all of their lives,” Pierce said. “They know that you have to move on to the next pitch, which will be tomorrow at 12:05. You have to let it go and get on to the next challenge.”