The UCF Knights made the opening game of the American Athletic Conference Tournament more exciting than they would have preferred, but a walk-off home run from UCF’s Andrew Brait lifted the Knights to victory. The fourth-seeded Knights defeated fifth-seeded Cincinnati 4-3 at BayCare Ballpark in dramatic fashion in Clearwater, Florida.
The Knights controlled the game throughout, but the bullpen could not hold onto a 3-0 lead, allowing a run in the 8th followed by a 2-run game-tying home run by Cincinnati’s Ryan Nicholson in the top of the 9th inning off UCF’s Kyle Kramer.
With one out in the bottom of the 9th, in a UCF lineup full of power hitters, it was the leadoff hitter Brait who walked it off with just his 3rd home run of the season. It was his first walk-off home run in his life. “I’ve only done it in summer ball, so it doesn’t really count” per Brait.
“I was just trying to get on base honestly. We got our big bat up next, so I was just trying to get anything hard. I fouled off a fastball earlier and I was trying to be out a little earlier. And he gave me a pitch I could really do some damage with,” said Brait. “It’s a great feeling.”
“Obviously it was a crazy 9th inning. But we found a way,” said victorious head coach Greg Lovelady after the game. “You’re just happy for the win.”
The late-game dramatics pulled some well-deserved attention away from UCF’s freshman starting pitcher Cam Leiter, who was a star for UCF. Leiter tossed 7 scoreless innings, allowing just 4 hits and a walk, while striking out 9.
“Cam Leiter was phenomenal today. I’m really proud of him. He pitched his tail off. He did a great job today,” said Lovelady. “He was able to use his changeup a lot more today and really keep the left handers off balance. And just competing and was able to find a way and gave us a chance.”
“I got ahead. I only walked one guy. I was just focused on getting outs and putting up zeros each inning,” said Leiter after the longest outing of his freshman season.
UCF got the scoring started in the Bottom of the 3rd inning. RF Tom Josten scored the game’s first run when DH Andrew Sundean was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded. The Knights went up 2-0 after 1B Nick Romano hit a sacrifice fly to deep left field to score Brait.
UCF’s dual-sport star John Rhys Plumlee doubled to lead off the bottom of the 4th and later scored on a sacrifice fly from SS Drew Faurot to give the Knights the 3-0 lead they held until the 8th.
UCF was able to score their first 3 runs without the benefit of a RBI base hit. Lovelady commented, “Offensively we did a couple good things with situational hitting. The sac fly, we took some hit by pitches. So we did a good job at that. But we just left too many guys on base. We had some opportunities to really open the game up, but we just couldn’t get the big hit.”
Cincinnati scored their first run in the 8th off UCF reliever Najer Victor after 2B Sean Springer tripled to right and later scored on a groundout.
The Knights win earned them a day off Wednesday. On Thursday UCF will face their interstate rival USF, who had their own dramatic victory over top-seeded East Carolina on Tuesday.
“Hopefully this gives us a little chance to slow down, relax. Get a day off tomorrow and then get back to work at practice and be ready to go Thursday,” said Lovelady.
Brait, wearing a white fedora-style hat in his postgame press conference, was ready for Wednesday’s day off. “A little beach day now.” And regarding the hat, he confirmed “I will be wearing this to the beach.”