HOOVER, Ala. — The first home run allowed by Gabe Gaeckle all season wound up being a postseason game-winner for South Carolina.
Cole Messina’s second two-run home run of the game was the difference as the Gamecocks beat the University of Arkansas 6-5 on Wednesday to send the No. 4 Razorbacks into the losers bracket at the SEC Tournament.
Messina’s shot to center field in the top of the ninth inning, his 19th of the season, came after Gaeckle (3-3) hit Blake Jackson with a pitch to lead off the inning.
“That guy, I knew he had a really good fastball,” Messina said. “I sold out for the fastball, and he ended up throwing a slider, and just took my best swing. Didn’t really think I was going to hit a slider, but it happened, and took a good swing, and the ball got out of here.
Messina also homered off Parker Coil in the fifth inning after Coil hit Jackson with his first pitch of the game, and he delivered a one-out RBI single in the third inning to drive in five of his team’s six runs.
“They don’t really have too many holes in that lineup and we maneuvered through it pretty good expect for one guy, and he killed us,” Arkansas Coach Dave Van Horn said.
Four of the runs for the Gamecocks (35-21) came from players who reached via walks or hit by pitch and the other two runs were Messina’s long balls.
“Free passes, at this time of year when everybody you play is good, they’ll come back and get you and they got us today,” Van Horn said.
South Carolina evened its season series with the Razorbacks at 2-2 and advanced to a winners bracket game against LSU on Thursday evening.
“Two of the best teams in the country, in my opinion. Could have gone either way,” South Carolina Coach Mark Kingston said. “Cole drove in five of our six runs, so that’s the team I think we’re capable of being on any given day, and we beat one of the best teams in the country.”
Arkansas (43-13) will take on SEC co-champion Kentucky in the 9:30 a.m. elimination game Thursday.
The Razorbacks will turn to lefty ace Hagen Smith (9-0, 1.52) who held the Wildcats to three hits in a 10-3 win on May 3 in Lexington, Ky.
Van Horn was coy about what kind of length he would ask of Smith, who will have a much more important start in an NCAA regional in Fayetteville next weekend.
“Yeah, I don’t want to say much,” Van Horn said.
South Carolina built leads of 1-0, 2-1 and 4-2 on Wednesday and the Razorbacks bounced back to tie the game each time. They almost did it again in the ninth.
After Messina’s ninth-inning blast, the Razorbacks mounted a rally against left-hander Garrett Gainey (1-3) in the bottom of the inning.
With one out, Peyton Stovall, Hudson White and Ben McLaughlin hit successive singles, with McLaughlin’s sending Stovall home to make it 6-5.
However, Gainey got Wehiwa Aloy to ground into a force out at second that nearly turned into a double play. He then retired Jared Sprague-Lott on a fly ball to left field to end the game.
Arkansas outhit the Gamecocks 9-8 but did not fully capitalize on its scoring opportunities.
When the Razorbacks battled back from a 4-2 deficit in the seventh inning to score twice, the first four batters reached base before the inning fizzled.
Pinch hitter Will Edmunson singled to open the inning, then Kendall Diggs singled and Stovall launched a double over the head of center fielder Austin Brinling to drive in a run. Hudson White walked to load the bases, still with no outs, but all the Razorbacks got after that was a sacrifice fly by McLaughlin for the tying run.
“Just on our side it’s kind of a game of maybe missed opportunities,” Van Horn said. “You know we had a couple of chances to blow it open, instead of a two-run inning maybe three or four. One hit away. That was disappointing. Give them credit for pitching out of a couple of jams.”
Stovall, who went 3 for 5 to raise his batting average to .353, agreed with Van Horn’s assessment.
“I felt like we’ve done a good job all year of putting ourselves in those positions, we’ve just got to be able to get that big hit,” Stovall said. “And instead of maybe a sac fly or punch in one, maybe getting a huge hit and scoring three or four.”
McLaughlin singled to lead off the second inning against Eli Jones and scored on Sprague-Lott’s single the opposite way to tie the game. McLaughlin walked to open the fourth and raced to third when Jones threw Aloy’s potential double-play grounder into center field. He scored on Ryder Helfrick’s sacrifice fly to make it 2-2.
Van Horn was still doing his in-game interview with the SEC Network as Coil hit Jackson and Messina cranked his first shot to center field.
“Coil hits the first batter he faces, a left-handed hitter that’s somebody we really need him to get out, and then I was still finishing up my interview, so I’m not sure exactly what pitch [Messina] hit, but he hit it and I watched it,” said Van Horn, who expressed frustration that both of Messina’s homers came after Jackson was hit by pitches and that South Carolina’s first inning ran came with two outs after Ben Bybee walked two batters and gave up an RBI single to Parker Noland.
Will Edmunson slides into home plate as he scores on Peyton Stovall’s RBI double that pulled Arkansas within 4-3 in the bottom of the seventh inning Wednesday against South Carolina at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium in Hoover, Ala. (NWA Democrat-Gazette/Charlie Kaijo)
