MIAMI GARDENS, Fla.—Southeastern wrapped up its third Sun Conference regular season championship in the last four years with a three-game sweep of Florida Memorial over the weekend.
Saturday, the Fire defeated the Lions 9-6 for their fifth three-game sweep of a Sun Conference opponent this season.
"When we can wrap up what we feel like is the best conference in the country a week early, it's a great accomplishment," said coach
Adrian Dinkel. "That's goal number one that we set out to do and we did it and we are happy with where we are at."
Isaac Nunez put the Fire up 2-0 with a double to left center field then scored on an error during
Jose Marcano's at bat to make it 3-0.
The Lions took the lead on a two-run triple to right by Yunior Sanchez to go up 4-3.
Starting pitcher
Logan Walters didn't give up another hit until the fourth inning and didn't give up any more runs. Walters went five innings with seven strikeouts to earn his fifth win of the season.
Stephen Cullen tied the game in the third with a sacrifice fly to score
Brian Fuentes and the Fire regained the lead when
Gary Lora scored on an error. Fuentes brought home
Abdel Guadalupe with a single up the middle in the fourth to go up 6-4.
Marcano ripped a ball through a stiff wind blowing in over the left field wall in the fifth to make it 7-4.
"We finally saw some pitches and swung at our pitches and not theirs," said Dinkel of the offense. "We delivered some barrels a little bit better and created some havoc on the basepaths."
The Lions got back in the game with a pair of RBI singles in the sixth to cut the deficit to one and had two on with two outs when
Ronnie Voacolo came in and struck out Fernando Vila to end the threat. Voacolo went 2.1 shutout innings with three strikeouts against seven batters.
Guadalupe pushed the advantage back to two in the eighth with a sacrifice fly and
Garrett Sheffield scored on a passed ball.
Juan Pimentel needed just 12 pitches to earn the save and work a scoreless ninth, getting a double play after surrendering the lone hit of the inning and a strikeout to end the game.
Cullen and
Shamir Morales had two hits each.
The Fire are back in action on Monday night to resume a suspended game at Webber International.
