Georgia baseball uga scott stricklin sec baseball

Georgia baseball coach Scott Stricklin is offering praise for his Bulldogs after they took one out of three games at No. 1 Arkansas last weekend.

“I’m proud of our guys,” said Stricklin, whose program is tied for fifth in the SEC East Division with Kentucky, 28-18 overall and 11-13 in league action.

“We fought hard and played well against the No. 1 team in the country with the biggest crowds of the season.”

Georgia has shown a trend of playing at the level of the competition, playing the Razorbacks tight all weekend starting with a 3-0 loss Friday before a 7-3 win Saturday and then Sunday’s 5-3 defeat.

This, just one week after allowing last-place Auburn to take two of three in Athens and fall back below .500 in conference action.

Georgia had a 3-0 lead in Sunday’s game in Fayetteville fueled by Oconee County’s Tate Brothers in the third inning. Cole Tate singled to start the inning and Connor Tate closed it with a two-run single.

Connor Tate has a 26-game on-base streak, including a nine-game hitting streak, and Cole Tate has a seven-game hitting streak and 16-game on-base streak.

The Razorbacks’ bats, however, were too much for Georgia’s Sunday bullpen after Jalen Battles homered to put Arkansas up 4-3 and chase starter Ryan Webb (3-4 ) off the mound. Webb retired 10 straight Arkansas batters at one point during his quality start.

Darryn Pasqua was first on in relief of Webb and issued a walk and induced a flyout before Stricklin went back to the bullpen for Michael Polk, who issued a walk and an RBI single that closed out the game’s scoring.

Georgia got two runners on in the eighth inning with one out, but was unable to push them across against Arkansas’ pitching.

“We were in every game and won Saturday,” Stricklin said. “To play like we did in this atmosphere, that was good for us. We’ll take Monday off as we’ve still got final exams. Then, we’ll get right back to work Tuesday and Wednesday before heading to Gainesville on Thursday.”

Georgia plays a pivotal three-game set at Florida this weekend before a May 18 date with Georgia Tech in Atlanta and a three-game home series with Ole Miss (May 20-22) that closes out the league portion of the schedule.