From May until their season ended in early June, no team in the country was playing better baseball than the Clemson Tigers. Starting with a three-game sweep of Louisville, the Tigers won sixteen straight games, claiming an ACC tournament championship, and posting a 12-5 victory over Lipscomb in their NCAA regional opener. Then, two days later, the season was over.
“All the momentum, and just the feeling like you’re just going full speed, pedal down, and then just to kinda hit that brick wall and just crash land,” Clemson head coach Erik Bakich said. ”That was just a tough, tough pill to swallow.”
Bakich joined SportsTalk on Monday night to preview the start of the new baseball season, but it was difficult not to look back at last year’s run and the disappointment that came with consecutive NCAA losses to Tennessee and Charlotte at Doug Kingsmore Stadium.
“We did have a remarkable turnaround but ultimately we finished the season not in Omaha,” lamented Bakich. “Clemson baseball has long been established as an Omaha program, and it’s just been way too long since the program has gotten there.”
Bakich is “cautiously optimistic” about the 2024 team and its chances to reach the College World Series for the first time since 2010. That journey begins on Friday as the Tigers host Xavier in the first of a three-game series beginning at 4pm.
