AVE MARIA, Fla. — It was fitting that the final conference series ended in a split for the Ave Maria Baseball team, and they achieved that by sweeping the doubleheader against the Webber Warriors Saturday. The two games had two completely different feelings, with the first game combined for 30 runs and the second game combining for just seven. The Gyrenes won the first game 17-13 and the second game 5-2.

After an early run for the Warriors in the second inning, the Gyrenes went on a 17-4 run between the second and fifth innings. Ave Maria scored all of their runs across the four frames, bringing home five in the second, four in the third, two in the fourth and six in the fifth.

Brian Williams brought home the first run with an RBI hit by pitch that scored Michael Kelly and kept the bases loaded. In the very next at bat, Jesus Gonzalez unloaded on a ball and hit his first grand slam of the season. It was also his 12^th homer of the year.

In the third inning, Michael Kelly got the frame started with a leadoff solo home run, getting his first dinger since April 4 and his seventh of the year. Williams got his second RBI of the game later in the inning, dropping a single into left field that scored Tanner Kelly. The final two runs of the frame came in off a two-RBI single from Kyle Van Leire.

Webber got four back in the top of the fourth, but it was still a comfortable five run lead for the Gyrenes after the inning.

In the bottom of the fourth, the Gyrenes scored two more runs, this time off a homer from Tanner Kelly. The dinger was also Kelly's 251^st career hit as a Gyrene, tying him with Alex Sanchez (2010-13) for the most career hits in program history.

In the fifth inning, Ave Maria brought home their final six runs of the ball game. Kyle Magdic got the party started with a dinger of his own, this time a three-run blast over the left field wall. It was his second home run of the season, with the first coming February 1 in the neutral site game against Arizona Christian. Magdic's dinger was the fourth and final homer of the game for the Gyrenes, matching a season-high for home runs in a game.

Williams got his third RBI with a bases-loaded walk and Van Leire brought home the final two runs with another two-RBI single that put the Gyrenes up 17-5.

Heading into the sixth inning, Ave Maria just needed to pitch two clean innings to secure the mercy-rule, but Webber had other plans. After the Gyrenes had gotten the scoring out of their system, the Warriors responded with four runs in the sixth and four runs in the eighth, getting back within four runs of Ave Maria.

Luke Zmolik came into the game with the bases loaded the Gyrenes up 17-12 with only one out in the top of the eighth inning. The first batter worked an RBI walk to get within four, but a double play ended things in the frame and kept the Gyrenes on top. In the ninth, Zmolik shut down the Warriors and got two strikeouts to end the game. For his performance, the senior pitcher earned his second save of the season.

Isaac Hines got the win for the Gyrenes as he was the first pitcher out of the bullpen. Starter Cam Horner had a really strong three innings to start but let in a few runs in the fourth inning. Hines cleaned things up in the frame and tossed one more to improve to 2-0 on the year.

Van Leire led the team in game one with a career-high three hits and four RBI. Dakota Jones, Tanner Kelly and Sebastian Cabeza all had multi-hit games as well.

After a combined 30 runs, it seemed like both teams had gotten all of the scoring out of their system heading into game two. The regular season finale was much quieter, with Ave Maria winning 5-2.

Michale Kelly opened the scoring in the first inning with a bases loaded walk that brought home Jesus Gonzalez. The Gyrenes had to settle for just the one run though as they left the bases loaded in the first.

In the fifth inning, Ave Maria extended their lead to 4-0 with a very loud three-run homer from Cabeza. It was his second dinger of the year, with the first coming earlier in the month on April 5, which was also a three-run blast.

As good as the Gyrenes were at the plate, Ave Maria was even better on the mound. In his final start at Bowie's Ballpark, graduate student Kevin Figueredo pitched a phenomenal seven inning start and shut down the Warriors. The lefty kept a no-hitter through 6.1 innings, the longest no-hit bid of the season for a Gyrene. The lone run he allowed came in the sixth inning and scored before he had allowed a hit. Figueredo also threw 115 pitches, which was the most he has tossed since April 1, 2023. Figueredo finished his start with a game score of 72, his highest score of the year.

Webber scored one more run in the eighth inning, but Davis Blair left the bags full of Warriors and preserved the lead.

The Gyrenes added a tally in the bottom of the frame to get back to a three-run lead.

After a leadoff walk in the top of the ninth, Blair struck out the next three batters to close out the game and get his fourth save of the season.

"Obviously, things [yesterday] didn't go the ways we wanted to, and obviously with this being a massive series for us, the message to the team was very simple: we're tougher and we needed to be tougher than the people we are playing," said interim head coach Pete Horner. "[Today we found] a way to be good enough to win. The offense was great in game one. [We] made some adjustments to the way they were pitching us, started hammering them a little bit. Then we flipped it in game two. Kevin Figueredo hats off to him, last start at the Bowie and he probably pitched the best game of his life, and it was just a credit to him. It puts us back into a position where we kind of need to be going into the conference tournament. [The] team is very hot [and] feeling themselves and they know that they are really tough."

With the doubleheader sweep, Ave Maria finishes the regular season with 27-23 record overall and 15-13 record in conference play. They finished tied for third with the Keiser Seahawks and own the tiebreaker having gone 5-3 against the top two teams in the Sun Conference while the Seahawks went just 3-5.

It is now onto JetBlue Park for the Sun Conference Tournament. It is the third year in a row the Gyrenes have made the postseason and the second year in a row they will act as the host just a few miles west in Fort Myers. As the three seed, Ave Maria will take on the fourth seed Seahawks in the late game Thursday, May 1. The winner of the game stays in the winner's bracket while the loser will face elimination on Friday. First pitch is set for 6 p.m. and the game will be streamed live on the Sun Digital Network.