With the College of Central Florida's 17-6 win over Seminole State College on Friday, Patriot's Head Coach, Marty Smith reached the 900 career win milestone. Smith, in his 29th season at CF, is the winningest active JUCO coach in the state of Florida. The win improved the #1 ranked Patriots to 29-1 on the season and 5-0 in Mid-Florida Conference play. This is the best start in school history after 30 games.

 

The Patriots jumped out to a 7-0 lead in the top of the third inning with the big blows coming from Juan Correa and Kareh Valentin who homered. Thad Ector joined the hit parade with an RBI single and an RBI double. Mike Guilliams drove home the Pats' seventh run with a single. The lead didn't last long as the Raiders chased CF starter, Logan Plasencia, out of the game in the bottom of the third inning with a pair of home runs. Austin Eppley relieved Plasencia but was met with more of the same as Seminole State got to within one run of the Pats at 7-6. Isaac Sewell (6-0) relieved Eppley and was able to stop the rally. That's all the runs the Raiders would get as Sewell completed the game by tossing 5.1 innings, allowing only two hits, no runs, one walk, and two strikeouts.

 

The Raiders bats may have gone quiet, but the high-powered offense of Central Florida did not. The Patriots would later score 9 runs in the top of the eighth inning. CF would get seven hits in the inning with run scoring singles by Edwin Toribio, Valentin, Guilliams, and John Marant. The big inning enabled the game to be called after eight innings due to the conference run-rule.

 

Leading hitters for the game included: Bradke Lohry (3-6, 2R, 2B), John Marant (3 RBI), Juan Correa (3-4, 3R, HR), Kareh Valentin (4-5, 3R, 5 RBI), Kainen Jorge (1-3, 3R, HR), Thad Ector (2-5, 2 RBI, 2B), Mike Guilliams (3-5, 2R, 2 RBI, 2B).

 

Game three of the series was scheduled for Saturday in Ocala, but was postponed to Sunday, 1:00 PM due to bad weather forecasted for Saturday in Ocala.