ATHENS, Ga. — The eighth-ranked Georgia baseball team beat Florida 9-4 to win its ninth straight game on Thursday at Foley Field.
The Bulldogs (39-12, 17-11 SEC) extended their SEC win streak to eight games.
In his second start of the season, sophomore Kolten Smith pitched eight innings, allowed 4 hits, 2 runs, 1 walk (intentional), and struck out a career-high 12 batters, the most for any Georgia pitcher this season.
“I’ve said it since the beginning of the year," Smith said. "We’ve got a really deep staff, and I’ve got a lot of faith in all of our guys, from top to bottom. Everybody’s going to get it done.”
Georgia coach Wes Johnson said Smith's performance was fun to watch.
"He took that baseball executing multiple pitches in the strike zone. You look at it, and people always ask, 'how do you wrack up strikeouts?' I have been asked that question a lot. You are around the zone," Johnson said. "Then you are able to command pitches and move them out of the zone if they start in the zone. Kolten did a phenomenal job. If you look at the cutter, the slider, the fastball, he threw a few good changeups. He even dumped a few 12-6s in there. He had it working tonight. He has been working really hard. If you think about it, he really went 12 strikeouts and no walks because the walk was intentional. I can't say enough about the job he did tonight. That was huge."
UP NEXT
Due to the high probability of inclement weather, first pitch of Friday’s match-up against Florida will now be at 1:02 p.m. ET. The game will be available on SECN+ and the Georgia Bulldogs Sports Network.
