ORLANDO - The UCF baseball team hit three home runs en route to a 10-3 win against the North Florida Ospreys Tuesday night at John Euliano Park.
Dom Stagliano threw six innings of one-run ball with a pair of strikeouts, while Tom Josten went 2-3 with six RBI, including two home runs, one of which was the third grand slam of his career.
"It's good when barrels are contagious," Josten said. "When you're swinging it well like that, the hits add up."
And add up they did, as the Knights recorded their seventh consecutive double-digit hit game. Seven UCF starters recorded hits in the contest, with three tallying a multiple-hit night.
The Knights and Ospreys exchanged zeroes for the first three innings to begin the midweek contest.
In the bottom of the fourth with one out and nobody on, second baseman Josten hit one over the right field fence, giving the Knights the 1-0 lead. The next batter was Ben McCabe who saw a 1-1 pitch and drilled it to left center for a double. With McCabe on second, designated hitter Andrew Sundean followed suit with a double down the left field line scoring McCabe and extending the lead to 2-0.
After Stagliano struck out Peyton Sybrandt swinging to begin the bottom half of the inning, Alex Lodise homered to left to get UNF back within one.
Cole Russo got the inning started for UCF in the fifth with a single to right field. John Rhys Plumlee advanced Russo to third with a double to right for the Knights' fourth extra-base hit of the night. Andrew Brait drove in Russo with an RBI single to make it 3-0. After Drew Faurot walked to load the bases with nobody out, Josten came to the plate, rocketing the first pitch he saw for a grand slam, his second homer of the night to give the Knights a six-run lead. Lex Boedicker added a homerun of his own with two outs just over the right field fence for the second homer of the inning.
Josten's grand slam was the first for the Knights since opening weekend of 2022, when Josten hit the second opening-weekend grand slam of his career against Siena on Feb. 19, 2022. Tuesday was the second multi-homer game of Josten's season.
Stagliano sat UNF down 1-2-3 on three straight groundouts in the top half the sixth inning. He retired 18 of the 21 batters he faced in six innings of work, totaling only 60 pitches.
The Knights loaded the bases again for Josten after two walks and a single. He drew a walk on a full count, giving him his sixth RBI of the game and UCF the 9-1 lead.
Josten is the first Knight to have six RBI in a single game since Dalton Wingo in 2019.
After a pitching change, UNF got a run back on a Jakob Runnels home run to right center, their second of the night making it 9-2.
With a runner on second, Brait put the Knights in double digits with his third hit and second RBI of the night, a single to left.
UNF's Runnels hit his second home run of the night to give the Ospreys three runs. A lineout to third ended the game, as the Knights defeated the Ospreys 10-3.
UP NEXT
The Knights will continue their 12-game homestand at John Euliano Park as they host Troy at 6 p.m. Friday to begin the three-game series. Games two and three will be played Saturday (4 p.m.) and Sunday (1 p.m.).
