Appearing much more like seasoned veteran rather than a freshman, Ty Cohen mowed down Florida Southern in his first dose of Sunshine State Conference competition to lead Florida Tech past the Mocs 11-0 on Tuesday evening. (FIT Image)
BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA – Appearing much more like seasoned veteran rather than a freshman, Ty Cohen mowed down Florida Southern in his first dose of Sunshine State Conference competition to lead Florida Tech past the Mocs 11-0 on Tuesday evening.
Facing a Florida Southern club that entered the night averaging a shade under 11 runs per game, the righty baffled the Mocs, limiting them to just four singles while striking out six and walking one.
The league’s top hitting team pounded out 15 more hits as all nine starters reached base safely. In addition, Florida Tech recorded its eighth double-digit run total of the season, already four more than all of 2014.
Greg Berkemeier
”Ty did an outstanding job of going out there and executing pitches tonight,” said head coach Greg Berkemeier.
“He was really, really good. He gave us a great outing and an opportunity to win. It was an all-around well-pitched game.”
Double-play duo Tyler Doughty and Reid Neal each notched three hits to lead the way, and left-fielder David Wilson smacked his second home run in as many games.
“The guys are doing a good job of putting together quality at-bats, and passing it off to the next guy,” said Berkemeier after his club’s 13th consecutive victory to begin the year.
The Panthers opened the scoring in the top of the second inning, pushing across the game’s first run after the Florida Southern infield committed three consecutive errors with two outs.
Turning the order over, Neal tacked on two more and Grant McKown added a fourth run to give Florida Tech an early 4-0 advantage.
Daniel Szpik
Following a quick 1-2-3 third inning by Cohen, right-fielder Daniel Szpik continued the scoring spree by spraying a double down the left-field line to score Doughty.
Ahead 6-0, Wilson welcomed Florida Southern’s Austin Barnett with a deep fly into the night on Barnett’s second pitch out of the bullpen for the third homer of his sophomore season.
FIT plated four more runs, and the bullpen worked two sharp innings to preserve the Panther shutout.
“I thought we did a pretty decent job of capitalizing on their mistakes early, and tacking on runs,” said Berkemeier. “We’ve got to continue to do better with two strikes. We can’t have that many punch-outs, but all in all it was a pretty good game by us. We’ve got to continue to strive to get better, though.”
FIT opens its SSC slate with a three-game series at Eckerd beginning Friday at 6 p.m.
