Where do you go from here if you’re South Carolina?
Logically, the only way to go is up. But with how much of a disaster this weekend was, it’s hard to envision what’s next for this ball club.
With a chance to salvage the series, the Gamecocks had a 6-4 lead going into the eighth inning on Saturday. But just like it had all weekend, Georgia scored 10 runs over the final two innings to secure a series sweep and 14-6 victory.
Here are my takes from an avoidable loss.
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Complete meltdown
I’m going to try and keep things as realistic as I can. This series was a nightmare from start to finish for South Carolina. The first two games of the series were rough, but Saturday might’ve been the worst one. It’s hard to believe this team had a 4-1 lead at one point in this game.
After 5.1 solid innings from newfound starter Garrett Gainey, Mark Kingston turned to his bullpen. Only needing 11 more outs to secure victory, his plan was to use Chris Veach and Dylan Eskew the rest of the way. Spoiler alert: that plan didn’t work.
Veach came in and gave up the tying run, though he did pitch well otherwise. Eskew on the other hand struggled mightily. He didn’t have much command on the mound as he gave up three runs on two hits after South Carolina had retaken the lead.
That wouldn’t be all, though. Connor McCreery came in later with the bases loaded, still in the eighth, and served up a go-ahead grand slam that would give the Dawgs the lead the rest of the day.
In total, the Gamecocks had to use six relievers after Gainey to get 11 outs. Again, 11 outs. The bullpen gave up seven earned runs on seven hits and walked five. This was like a knockout punch in a fight. South Carolina could never recover after that.
Perspective on what’s next
From a big picture standpoint, I think you can forget about seeing postseason baseball at Founders Park this summer. Barring some miracle run the next two weeks, the Gamecocks had their chance to handle business and couldn’t do so.
So instead, I’d say get ready to watch this team from your couch as they’ll more likely than not travel on the road to whatever regional they make in the NCAA Tournament. And yes, I believe they are making the tournament, regardless of what happens the rest of the year. Their RPI saves them.
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South Carolina still has to play one more regular season series before heading to Hoover for the SEC Tournament. The Gamecocks will travel to Knoxville on Thursday to face No. 1 Tennessee. And if you thought this series was bad, things could get uglier from here. And that’s not to say they can’t go in and find a way to scratch off a win or two. But the Vols are a solid team, and we’ll get into them more as the series approaches.
As of right now, you can definitely feel an energy shift after this weekend, at least I can. It’s almost like everything that could’ve gone wrong did go wrong, and it’s hard to recover from that. You can sense that there is going to be some sort of change on the horizon. What that could look like is a topic for another day. But with at least three weekends to go, things have to turn around rather fast.
Garrett Gainey is now your game three starter
Well, at least South Carolina has one capable starting pitcher, right? After a few weekends now with, for the most part, some rough starting pitching, Kingston has one solidified arm moving forward, which is Gainey.
Like I said before, Gainey tossed 5.1 innings of two-run ball against this Georgia lineup. Kingston kept saying after the game Gainey proved that it’s possible to pitch well against the Dawgs. He was seemingly the only one to be able to do so, plus a select few relievers.
Moving forward, Gainey will be a part of this weekend rotation for the foreseeable future. He got up to 81 pitchers on Saturday and will continue to build up to 100 pitches. Expect him to be ready to hit that threshold by Hoover or the NCAA Tournament.
If I were to make an early guess, the weekend rotation for Knoxville needs to be Ty Good, Eli Jones and Gainey. I mean, what else could it really be? If you can manage to get five decent innings from the first two guys and another strong outing from Gainey, you have a chance in any series. It’s just you need Good and Jones to do well like Gainey has. But we’ll see.
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