Big inning leads UGA to 13-4 victory over South Carolina
Lightning didn’t strike twice for the Gamecocks.
Coming off a lights-out, complete game performance from Clarke Schmidt Friday, South Carolina burned through four pitchers and gave up 19 hits in a 13-4 loss to Georgia.
The majority of Georgia’s runs came early as the jumped on starter Braden Webb in the third inning. The freshman was shelled for eight runs on seven hits in the inning. Webb also walked a batter in the inning.
He was chased off the mound with one out in the third.
“They swung the bats pretty well and eight in the third inning was certainly enough to win the game,” head coach Chad Holbrook said. “You can’t give up big innings in this league and expect to win. And that inning got away from us there.”
It was the righty’s shortest outing of the season and the nine hits and eight earned runs allowed were both career highs. The eight-run inning was also Georgia’s highest-scoring inning this season.
“I just put the ball over the plate and they hit it; baseball’s what happened,” Webb said. “Stuff like that’s going to happen, you just have to learn from it.”
Every hit in the inning was a single and balls were scooting just past the infielders and squirt into the outfield.
“We didn’t keep the ball in the infield on some balls we should have kept in the infield,” Holbrook said. “We just didn’t do a good job of limiting the damage and keeping the ball in the infield.”
Reed Scott came in to relieve Webb and gave up three runs on six hits before leaving in the sixth innings. Tyler Haswell was the next pitcher and he gave up another two runs in one inning pitched.
Georgia scored 13 runs on 19 hits, both season highs for the Bulldogs.
The Gamecocks would score runs in the seventh on a DC Arendas single and in the ninth on an Arendas groundout and a Gene Cone two-run home run. It was Cone’s second home run and eleventh RBI of the year.
“Over the last ten or twelve days or so he’s been our most consistent offensive player from the quality at-bats he’s given every time in there,” Holbrook said. “We have to have some jump on board with Gene because right now, it’s too inconsistent.”
South Carolina went a combined 7-for-27 from the plate (.259) with five walks. After Cone, the next four batters in the order went a combined 2-for-14 with two walks and six strikeouts.
“Hopefully we can get out of the funk we’re in offensively, bet more competitively in the batter’s box and hit it harder than our opponent,” Holbrook said. “Right now our opponent’s hitting the ball a lot harder than we are.”
South Carolina plays Georgia Sunday in the rubber match of the series. First pitch is scheduled for 1 p.m. and it can be seen on SEC Network+. Adam Hill will start for South Carolina.
The Gamecocks have a chance to get back to playing back to the way they were at the beginning of the season. Holbrook said he’ll keep sticking with the usual suspects tomorrow when the team takes the field at 1 p.m.
“Our guys that I’ve been playing have put us in a good spot,” he said. “Just because we hit a little rough patch, it’s not time to throw them overboard. We’ve got to get back to playing the way they’re capable of performing.”
Line score 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9--R H E
South Carolina 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 3 4 7 2
Georgia 0 0 8 1 0 1 1 2 X 13 19 0
Pitching Lines
South Carolina
Braden Webb: 2.1 IP, 9 H, 8 R (8 ER), 3 BB, 3 K, 1 WP
Reed Scott: 4 IP, 6 H, 3 R (3 ER) 1 BB, 2 K
Tyler Haswell: 1 IP, 3 H, 2 R (2 ER), 0 BB, 1 K, 1 WP
Brandon Murray: .2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 1 K
Georgia
Connor Jones: 6.2 IP, 4 H, 1 R (ER), 4 BB, 5 K
Mike Mancuso: 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K
Adam Goodman: 1 IP, 3 H, 3 R (3 ER), 0 BB, 1 K, 1 HBP
Starting lineups
South Carolina: RF, Gene Cone; 2B, Madison Stokes; LF, Alex Destino; 3B, Jonah Bride; CF, Dom Thompson-Williams; DH, John Jones; 1B, LT Tolbert; C, Chris Cullen; SS, DC Arendas; SP Braden Webb
Georgia: SS, Nick King; RF, Skyler Weber; 1B, Trevor Kieboom; LF, Keegan McGovern; C, Michael Curry; DH, Daniel Nichols; CF, Stephen Wrenn; 2B, LJ Talley; SP, Connor Jones