The 11-0 start for the USC baseball team is nothing more than a distant memory now as SEC play begins for the Gamecocks Friday night. In their first game since being swept at Texas last weekend, the Gamecocks did not bring much to Founders Park Wednesday night in a 9-4 loss to Davidson. The Wildcats had lost 24 straight to USC last winning in 1975.
The Wildcats used a five run 3rd inning, thanks to a pair of two-run doubles, to take a 5-1 lead. They added two more runs in the 4th for a 7-2 advantage, and single runs in the 5th and 6th for a 9-3 edge.
Wes Clarke did provide a late highlight for the Gamecocks with his 10th homer of the season in the 7th. But the Gamecocks continued their recent trend of failing to hit with runners in scoring position. They were 3-15 (.200) in that category against the Wildcats, and 4-23 (.174) with runners on base. The Gamecocks stranded a total of 12 baserunners.
Nine different pitchers worked for USC. Travis Luensmann, who took the loss, and Jackson Phipps were the least effective. They yielded 6 hits and 7 runs in working in the 3rd and 4th innings.
The Gamecocks are 11-4 and will open SEC play Friday night at 2nd ranked Vanderbilt.
Well, same old bug, can’t hit, this continues to baffle the gamecock hitters, so we barely beat Clemson in two games, now against good teams we can’t hit and we starting to fall apart now in the last two games, the pitching looks to be good in our first two starters, but the hitting is not there, and last night it looked very stagnate , team looked to be mourning over the Texas series, those that thought it was just game(s) to get better, young teams psyche can be damaged, you beat Clemson remember, your on the way, but Clemson doesn’t look great either, maybe we’re another middle of the road teams or worse, the SEC will chew us up. The question is now, can the coaching staff bring them round, well Vanderbilt will not treat them nicely, we maybe seeing a team growing up or falling away, will they adjust and fight back, last night was a poor showing, can HBC Mark Kingston bring them through, we’ll see, not looking good after the last two games. Go Gamecocks…..