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Over the weekend, USF baseball had a chance to make history.  Instead, something else happened.

Looking Back

Going into the final weekend of the regular baseball season, there was a three-way tie for first place in the conference.  As is typical in these situations, there were a lot of ways that each of those teams could win the conference.  The stage was set beautifully for USF.  They enjoyed the only top 25 ranking in the conference and only had to beat UCF to win the regular season crown.  They started things off right in Orlando on Friday, beating the Knights, 7-4 and earning their 40th win for the first time since 1996

Friday’s game should have been a warning, however, as it took extra innings for the Bulls to get that victory against a team that they had swept in previous series this season.  UCF got their revenge in game two of the series, dropping the Bulls 9-1 and killing any chance for USF to win the conference outright.  Just as the stage was set nicely for USF, the same was true for the Knights.  With their first win against USF, they then were favored to win a piece of that crown. 

And, they did, after winning the third game of the series, 3-2. The Knights are regular season co-champions with Houston, with whom they own a tiebreaker.  That tiebreaker will give them the #1 seed in the upcoming conference tournament, where the Bulls will have one more chance to show that they deserved the national recognition they were getting.

The loss to the Knights dropped USF to the #4 seed in the conference tournament.  They will face Tulane for the first game of that playoff on Tuesday at 1PM at Clearwater's Spectrum Field.

In this 100-days-away college football primer, CBS Sports names Charlie Strong #38 and Quinton Flowers  #65 of their “100 things to fire you up.”  

Looking Forward

Four Bulls field and track athletes have qualified for the NCAA East Preliminary, being held this week in Lexington, Kentucky

Incoming USF men’s basketball coach, Brian Gregory, is pleased with the way that his staff has rebuilt the roster.  The Bulls were down to just four scholarship players when Gregory was hired.  In that span of time, Gregory and his staff have added nine players.

The Tampa Bay Times’ Joey Knight has been reading the football season previews.  He notes that the respect given to the Bulls is tempered with some jabs.  

Fanragsports' Kyle Kensing writes that "Charlie Strong will strike back with USF."

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