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A bunch of guys from Florida had a huge day at Lindsey Nelson Stadium on Saturday.

The strange thing is they weren't Gators. Tennessee baseball's Florida connection - led by Shawn Griffin, Yan Gomes, Nick Hernandez and Danny Wiltz - powered the Vols to a 5-4 victory in the first game of a doubleheader and a 10-5 lead in game two when play was suspended by rain in the bottom of the sixth inning.

Game two will resume where it left off at noon today. The series finale - reduced to a seven innings - will follow 30 minutes after completion of the suspended game.

The Vols (18-10, 6-4 SEC) used a strong effort on the mound from Hernandez (a sophomore from Hialeah, Fla.), a two-run home run from Griffin (a senior left fielder from Hollywood, Fla.) and a save from Wiltz (junior reliever from Miami, Fla.) to edge the 13th-ranked Gators in the opener.

"I was locked in, especially for this game," Hernandez said of his first victory this season. "There was an extra focus there and I was really amped up for this one."

After four straight no-decisions, he struck out a career-high 11 and walked one in 71<0x2044>3 innings. Of his 118 pitches, 78 were for strikes.

While Hernandez kept things close, it was Griffin who had the momentum-changing bomb in the sixth.

"I was born in Jacksonville and you're either a Gator or a (Florida State) Seminole," Griffin said. "I've got my family split right down the middle. My grandfather is a big Gator fan and my cousins are all Seminole fans. So it's a big deal."

So was Griffin's home run.

He pulled off his best imitation of "The Natural," crushing a Billy Bullock pitch off the lights in right field for a game-tying two-run homer.

"I try to make it a point to be some sort of an influence during a game so I have something to talk about when I go back home," Griffin said.

The folks definitely have something to talk about now. It's the second weekend in a row Griffin has hit a towering homer.

"I did the same thing against Auburn and it came down in what they call the 'K' corner," he said. "The people down there gave me the ball and wrote "The Natural" on it. It's one of the nicest compliments I've had, but I don't know where all this is coming from."

For the record, Griffin signed the home run ball hit Saturday and gave it back to a young UT fan.

The Vols added three more runs in the seventh to make it 5-2. They would need the cushion.

Sophomore first baseman Jeff Lockwood led off with a loop single, advanced to third on a sac bunt and sac fly and scored on a passed ball. Freshman Cody Grisham had a two-out double, Andy Simunic walked and Kentrail Davis (an Alabama native who played summer ball for the Florida Bombers) hit a two-RBI double the opposite way.

The Eastern Division leading Gators (20-9, 7-3) made it interesting in the ninth, getting a two-run triple from Avery Barnes (3-for-5), but Wiltz picked up his third save when UT third baseman Cody Brown made a nice stop and gunned out Cole Figueroa at first.

Griffin and Davis each went 2-for-4 with two RBIs to lead UT's seven-hit attack. Defensively, the Vols committed no errors for only the fifth time this season.

In suspended game two, the Vols rallied from a 5-0 deficit as starter Bryan Morgado struggled with his control before being drilled in the hindquarters with a line drive in the fifth.

Gomes, another Floridian from Miami, belted a three-run homer to ignite an eight-run fifth for the Vols. Griffin added a solo shot over the scoreboard to make it back-to-back and freshman right fielder Josh Liles finished the scoring with a two-run shot - his first homer as a Vol.

© 2008, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.