FORT MYERS, Fla. — The Ave Maria Baseball team lost their second game of the Sun Conference Baseball Tournament Friday afternoon, knocking them out of the tournament. The Gyrenes fell to the Southeastern Fire 16-4.

Ave Maria got a couple of doubles of the first inning, but those ended up being their only hits of the afternoon. Tanner Kelly recorded the first double in the first inning, bringing him to 253 hits in his career. His brother Michael Kelly got the other with a leadoff double in the second but was left stranded on the basepaths.

Outside of those doubles, the Gyrenes could not get anything started against Southeastern's starter, Reece Wissinger, who tossed seven innings and struck out nine batters.

In the bottom halves of the innings, the Fire had an answer for everything Ave Maria threw at them. Southeastern scored three runs in the first, six runs in the fourth, two runs in the fifth, three runs in the seventh and two runs in the eighth to get up to 16.

In the top of the ninth inning, the Gyrenes scored their four lone runs of the game. Ave Maria did not record a hit in the frame, but three walks and a hit by pitch brought in the first run. A throwing error from the Fire's pitcher allowed two more runs to score, and the final run crossed home plate after a wild pitch. The runs kept the Gyrenes scoring streak alive, bringing home a run in all 52 games of the season. It is the first season since 2022 that Ave Maria has not been shutout in any of the games.

With the loss, Ave Maria falls to 27-25 and exits the Sun Conference Tournament.

The Gyrenes now await to see if their regular season was enough to earn an at-large bid into the National Tournament. Ave Maria was the last team to receive votes in the final coaches' poll released on April 30, essentially making them the 36^th ranked team in the country. Forty-six teams make the tournament and the Gyrenes are definitely on the bubble. The only thing holding them back is every at large team in the last three seasons has won 30 or more games. The last at-large team to get in with less than 30 wins was Westmont (Calif.) in 2021 with a record of 27-18.

If this is the end of the line for the Gyrenes, the 2025 season will go down as a successful one. Ave Maria posted their third winning record in four years and their fourth winning record total. At 15-13 in conference play, it was just the third winning record against Sun Conference teams. The Gyrenes never lost a conference series, going 1-0-6, with that win going against the then #6 Fire.

Individually, Tanner Kelly and Jordan Crawford recorded the first two cycles in Ave Maria history. Kelly also broke the record for career hits (253), Jimmy Coffey tied for the second-longest hit streak in program history (19 games), and Jesus Gonzalez had the fifth longest on-base streak and the fourth most home runs. On the mound, Kevin Figueredo threw 6.1 perfect innings against Webber, the longest any pitcher has stayed perfect in three years at Ave Maria. Cam Horner stacked up five more wins on his school career record (25) and Hunter Cashero threw two separate complete game shutouts.

It's been a wild ride for the Gyrenes in 2025. The only thing left to do is wait and see if it will continue or start prepping for 2026. The NAIA selection show is Wednesday, May 7, at 5 p.m. ET on the NAIA Network.