No. 20 Florida State earned its first ACC win and first win over a ranked opponent this season on Friday night, riding a five-home run offensive performance and a dominant complete-game shutout from left-hander Wes Mendes to run rule No. 12 Wake Forest in seven innings.
Eli Putnam homered twice, with Nathan Cmeyla, Brayden Dowd and Myles Bailey also each knocking one.
The Seminoles jumped on Wake Forest starter Blake Morningstar early and never let up. Bailey got things started with a two-run shot
to center in the first (his seventh of the year), with Dowd adding a two-run blast of his own in the third.
The fourth inning blew the game open as Putnam led off with a solo shot before DeLamielleure capped a three-run frame with a two-run single through the middle. Morningstar was done after four innings, having allowed nine runs on nine hits. Cmeyla and Putnam went back-to-back to open the fifth off reliever Luke Schmolke (Cmeyla’s first of the year and Putnam’s second of the night) to make it 9-0. FSU’s final run came in the sixth, when Dowd scored on a Putnam 6-4-3 double play after singling and moving up on a Cmeyla single.
Wake Forest’s only real threat came in the seventh, when Mendes put two on with no outs before retiring the next three batters to end the game via run rule.
The lefty threw a complete-game shutout in the win, a lights-out performance that saw him face just 24 batters across seven innings, striking out 11 and allowing only two hits and two walks. He improved to 8-0 on the season with a 0.63 ERA,
The second game of the series is set for 4 p.m. on Saturday, with Trey Beard (LHP) to get the start for the Seminoles
