GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- Friday began to get away from Bethune-Cookman when Jason Beverlin had to start making long-term calls.

Anthony Maldonado had just thrown 35 first-inning pitches. The second inning wasn't  getting any better.  He's a freshman with a promising future. Florida State league pitchers are yanked after 75 or so to save arms. So began what seemed like a midweek procession that included Donte Lindsay, Isaak Gutierrez and Tyler Krull.

Demetrius Sims got tagged by an inside pitch in the third. By the fourth, it was 7-0. There's a game Saturday. There's also a Major League Baseball  draft in a few weeks. Sims went to the training room. Enter Brandon Amendolare to hit and Nate Sterijevski  moving from second to shortstop.

That kind of day.

This was supposed to be the debut of the good-enough-to-be-a- third-seed edition of Bethune-Cookman baseball, but it ended up just-another-June-Friday-in-Gainesville, even though USF  displayed an edition of why-we-were-good-enough-to-get-a- two-seed-as-an-at-large in its 9-1 victory.

"Definitely disappointing," Beverlin said. "We're a lot better than we showed today."

If the Gainesville humidity wasn't sucking the life out of the proceedings, the early deficit did, along with the little things you can't do in June.

The Wildcat procession on the mound gave up a combined seven walks and five wild pitches. If this was softball, the Bulls would have been chanting "we like free bases."

"[USF] Hitters were in the driver seat all day," Beverlin said. "You fall behind hitter after hitter, it's gonna be tough."

Positives?

Josten Heron made a nice running catch in center field.

Danny Rodriguez snagged a line drive.

Lindsay and Krull finished a couple of innings with punchouts.

Chase DeBonis tagged that ninth-inning yard shot so we wouldn't have to look up the last time Bethune-Cookman was shut out in regional play. (It was 2012 when Florida no-hit us. See? Why drudge that up again? Sheesh).

So now it's 12 p.m. Saturday to avoid becoming just-another-two-and-out.

"We want to make the most of it," said senior Austin Garcia, who had two hits Friday. "We need to get done. I don't want say the season is for nothing if we don't win, but we don't want to end it going 0-2."