South Carolina Baseball: Gamecocks lost at Arkansas, drop third straight series
By Kevin Miller
The skid continued for South Carolina baseball this weekend as the YardCocks lost two out of three to drop their third straight SEC series. While playing on the road against Arkansas is no easy feat, losing a third straight series is tough at any time.
The good news for Carolina fans is that the three-game set in Fayetteville seemed more competitive. After an extremely poor showing in Lexington, Kentucky last weekend, the Gamecock pitching was significantly better against the Hogs. However, the Carolina bats struggled, especially with runners on base. Arkansas’ pitchers fanned the Gamecocks 34 different times, with South Carolina going down on strikes at least ten times in each contest.
Eli Jones delivered an absolute gem on Friday night as he took over the opening night role in lieu of the struggling Will Sanders. Jones delivered five innings of one-run ball before Cade Austin allowed an inherited run to score, bringing Jones’ responsibility up to two earned runs. Jones struck out ten Razorbacks and gave the Gamecocks a great opportunity to win the ball game. Unfortunately, the offense couldn’t score against Arkansas hurler Hagen Smith as a Braylen Wimmer RBI single was the only run plated. Arkansas took game one, 4-1.
Another excellent Gamecock pitching performance came in on Saturday as Jack Mahoney pitched seven innings of shutout ball, and the bullpen allowed just one to score in the 8th. The Carolina offense struggled again, but the bats got four of their six hits all in the 4th inning to score three runs. Gavin Casas, Braylen Wimmer, and Evan Stone delivered the RBI singles, and the one-inning “outburst” was enough to pull off a 3-1 victory thanks to Mahoney’s dominance.
The Sunday finale saw a similar script as the first two contests. South Carolina’s offense couldn’t get anything going against Hunter Hollan. In fact, Hollan went the distance against the Gamecocks as he only allowed one run (a Will Tippett homer) on five hits. Matthew Becker pitched well until running into trouble in the 5th and 6th inning when gave up three of his four earned runs. That was all Arkansas needed behind Hollan’s effort, and the Gamecocks fell again, this time 5-1.
All-in-all, losing two out of three on the road to a top-5 program is not the end of the world. However, with Carolina’s recent struggles, the series loss weighs heavier than normal. The Gamecocks are likely out of the picture for a top-8 seed in the NCAA Tournament barring a strong series against Tennessee and lots of other top teams losing next weekend. Hosting a regional (top-16 seed) is still a possibility, but “possibility” is a disappointment when “virtual lock” could have been used to describe Carolina’s chances of hosting just two weeks ago.
Four regular season games remain for South Carolina baseball before the SEC Tournament begins. A mid-week contest at home against Charlotte (Charlotte beat the Gamecocks in Charlotte earlier in the year) awaits Mark Kingston’s team on Tuesday. The red-hot Tennessee Volunteers will travel to Columbia for the final series of the year.
The mid-week tilt against Charlotte will be played at 7:00 on SECNetwork+ on Tuesday. The Tennessee series will be a Thursday through Saturday affair with games one and two being played on SECNetwork+ at 7:00 on Thursday and Friday, respectively. The regular season finale will be at 2:00 on Saturday on the SECNetwork.