The Knights (13-12, 3-0) welcomed themselves into the American Athletic Conference with authority this weekend, coming away with a clean three game sweep of the Cincinnati Bearcats (8-14, 0-3). The series sweep propelled UCF into first place within the American, standing on the shoulders of Louisville, Temple, and USF – who all won 2 of 3 in the first weekend of conference play.
“I tell you the guys did a great job. They’ve been playing well this past week and again, they have continued to be resilient, confident, their work ethic has been great and they stick with it,” said Head Coach Terry Rooney.
UCF won 7-1 on Friday, 7-4 on Saturday, and wrapped the series up with a 5-1 thumping on Sunday afternoon. That’s an encouraging run differential of 19-6 for a young offense in need of a big week after the tough FSU series.
“When you look back at it, it was a total team effort,” said Rooney.
UCF had struggled to bring a roster featuring over 20 new faces completely together with much consistency before conference play. They had not swept a series since Opening Weekend, had lost six games in extra innings, a few more by less than two runs, and could not hold onto a lead late in the game. The Cincinnati series is a testament to the team’s hunger to improve after a rocky start to the season.
“I think it’s really important,” said Rooney of starting conference play red-hot. “I keep going back to where we were, and a lot of teams wouldn’t have responded the way these kids responded. It’s a credit to the leadership on the team, and within the program.”
The starting pitching shone brighter than any other component of the Knights’ weekend performance. They ate up 17.1 innings to support a bullpen that is still finding its’ consistency, sat down 15 batters on strikes, walked only 6, gave up only 6 hits, and allowed only one earned run.
Even among stalwart starters, Knights’ Ace Eric Skoglund stood out when he spun a complete game shutout on Friday night to set the tone for UCF conference play. He was in total command of the Cincinnati batters; striking out eight, surrendering two hits, and relinquishing zero walks.
Ryan Meyer got the first win of his career on Sunday afternoon with a 3.0 inning long relief appearance, allowing two base-runners and giving up no earned runs.
Tommy Williams, Erik Barber, and Sam Tolleson all went deep once each this weekend, and along with James Vasquez combined for 12 RBIs between the four of them. Barber and Williams really had themselves a weekend with 4 RBIs each, though Williams went 5-12 to Barber’s 3-9.
UCF will next gear up host Bethune-Cookman at 6:30 on Wednesday night and Temple this weekend.
