Cooper Walls will start vs. Troy in Gainesville Regional Final

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Florida will start sophomore pitcher Cooper Walls against Troy in the Gainesville Regional Final on Monday, Gators Online has learned. It will be his 10th start of the season.

Walls served as Florida’s Sunday starter to open 2026 and has a 3-2 record on the year. He has posted a 6.87 ERA with 36.2 innings pitched, 32 runs allowed and 35 strikeouts.

Walls set the tone at No. 5 FSU with 3.1 innings of one-run ball in a 4-3 thriller to complete the season sweep of the Seminoles at Dick Howser Stadium.

“Cooper Walls pitched outstanding,” UF coach Kevin O’Sullivan said after the win at Florida State.

The Gators (41-20, 18-12 SEC) got off to a 2-0 start in the Gainesville Regional before an 11-6 loss to Troy on Sunday. Now they will throw Walls with their season on the line.

Caden McDonald, Luke McNeillie and Joshua Whritenour are among the available arms in Florida’s bullpen for the rematch against the Trojans on Monday night.

“We’re gonna have to be really strategic in how we use our arms. We’re probably have to use quite a few,” O’Sullivan said of his pitching staff. “Well, I feel good. I wish we had Barbs, honestly, but we had to obviously use him last night because we only we got three innings out of Aidan. We gave up a lead. We had, you know, a significant lead. So, the bottom line is we’re just gonna have to have a bunch of guys go out there to and give us two innings and then next somebody goes out there and just hand the ball to Josh at the end.”

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