No. 17 Florida State (21-3, 4-3 ACC) defeated Louisville (16-10, 2-5 ACC) 8-3 Thursday evening at Dick Howser Stadium to take game one of the three-game series.

Designated hitter Marco Dinges paced the Seminole offense, finishing 3-for-4 with three runs and five RBI. The Beekman, New York, native hit two double and a grand slam, his seventh home run of the season.

Joe Charles earned his first career save, facing the minimum nine batters over the final three innings. Charles’ 3.0 innings and four strikeouts were both career bests. Charles entered with the bases loaded and no out in the seventh inning, striking out a pair before an inning-ending groundout energized the Howser crowd.

Starting pitcher Cam Leiter improved to 5-1 with 5.2 innings pitched and 12 strikeouts, one off his career high. He was pitching on short rest after last week’s opener vs. Clemson was moved to Saturday afternoon.

Louisville took an early 2-0 lead in the second inning before the Noles chipped into the deficit. Dinges’ grand slam broke a 2-2 tie in the fifth inning as Charles and Andrew Armstrong combined for 3.1 scoreless innings in relief.

OF NOTE:

• Marco Dinges hit two doubles and a grand slam, his seventh home run of the year and first career grand slam. As a team, FSU’s six grand slams are two shy of the school-record eight hit in 1996.

• Dinges set or tied career highs with two doubles, five RBI, three runs, three hits and eight total bases. Dinges accounted for all three of FSU’s extra-base hits.

• Max Williams led off the game with a bunt single to extend his hitting streak to a career-long five games. He added a second infield single in the third inning and had FSU’s first two hits of the night.

• Cam Leiter struck out 12 batters, his fifth career game and third this season with double-digit strikeouts. FSU struck out 17 batters as a team after beginning the day second nationally with 12.8 strikeouts per nine innings.

• Cam Smith singled and drew a walk, extending his on-base streak to 34 games. Jaime Ferrer was hit by a pitch in the third inning to push his on-base streak to 30 games.

• Faurot and Smith extended their hit streaks to four games; Dinges has reached safely in six straight.

• Smith was 2-for-4 Thursday; he began the series third nationally with 1.91 hits per game, fifth with 44 hits and 10^th with a .444 batting average.

• DeAmez Ross made his 52^nd appearance for the Seminoles but first off the bench. Ross had missed the previous seven games due to injury. He scored on Dinges’ seventh-inning double from first base.

• FSU has a home run in 21 of 24 games this season.

UP NEXT: The Noles and Cardinals will play the second game of the series Friday at 6:00 p.m. FSU will throw LHP Jamie Arnold, the nation’s ERA leader at 0.52. Arnold is 5-0 on the year.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FSU baseball wins opener over Louisville behind Dinges and Charles