By this point of the season, Florida softball coach Karen Johns expects her four unclassmen pitchers to be more mature than their makeup. And they proved their coach correct this weekend.
For the second day in a row, sophomore Amanda Moore shut down No. 25 Wisconsin, and led the Gators to a 3-1 win Sunday at the Florida Softball Stadium. The victory gave Florida the Gator Invitational title in front of 323 fans.
The Gators shutout streak was snapped at 39 innings when the Badgers scored a run with two outs in the seventh.
"Shutting people out for that long has been a big thing. I don't think we've done that since I've been here," Johns said. "That's a big boost for our pitching staff."
Moore (9-8) faced 17 batters through five innings. She finished with three strikeouts, but walked just one batter.
"(Moore) kept us off balance," Wisconsin coach Karen Gallagher said. "She did a nice job of mixing it up a little bit, and we just didn't make our adjustments."
Moore prevented the Badgers (17-9) from getting any kind of rally going until the seventh inning. But she got the final batter to ground out to end the threat.
On the flipside, Florida (19-21) had eight hits.
Freshman Mandy Schuerman, hitless in her past seven at-bats, broke out of her slump in the first inning with her fifth home run of the season.
Moving back into the lead-off spot - she was the lead-off hitter at the beginning of the season - Schuerman drove a 2-2 pitch over the centerfield fence to give the Gators a 1-0 lead.
"With my feet, they were moving too much and and they were moving my eyes, and I couldn't see the ball right," said Schuerman, who struck out five times in two games Saturday. "We've been working a lot with my eyes and working on seeing the pitch, and that helped out tremendously."
But Florida failed to get much production after Schuerman's homer in the next few innings.
Andrea Kirchberg (10-8) struck out the side in the first three innings - she finished with 12 strikeouts - but she started having trouble in the fourth.
In both the fourth and fifth innings, the Gators had runners in scoring position but failed to push them across home plate.
"I thought we got a little tentative in the middle, and then we started coming out again at the end," Johns said. "(Kirchberg) is a very good pitcher; she locates her pitches very well."
But Florida did not waste its chances in the sixth inning, scoring two runs.
Jenilee Garner led off with a single to left and scored on Jennifer Mossadeghi's single down the left-field foul line. Katy Berger then attempted a sacrifice bunt, but Kirchberg threw the ball away and Mossadeghi, who was 3-for-3 in the game, added another run.
"They're a good hitting team," Gallagher said. "They're aggressive at the plate, and it's going to get you sooner or later."
