Offense struggles as Gamecocks' Hoover woes continue

Box Score | Changes coming for the Gamecocks

HOOVER, ALA.—Another year another winless trip to the SEC Tournament for the Gamecocks. South Carolina dropped their eighth-straight game in Hoover, falling Thursday to Texas A&M 4-1.

“I’m at a loss for words with that,” head coach Chad Holbrook said. “We’ve had great regular seasons and we get here and for some reason and haven’t played well. I don’t know how to explain it. I think the best way to explain it is we’ve lost to some really good teams.”

Coming off a game against Ole Miss where a shaky first inning doomed the team, the Gamecocks (42-15, 20-11 SEC) looked poised to make sure that didn’t happen again.

Freshman righty Braden Webb mowed through the top third of the Aggie order, registering one strikeout. Then the second inning happened.

Webb issued a leadoff walk and then a wild pitch moved the runner to second. Then he gave up three straight one-out hits, including one double, and watched as three Aggie runners crossed home.

He would limit the damage and head to the dugout with the Gamecocks behind 3-0. South Carolina would plate a run in the following inning, scoring on a Marcus Mooney single and a fielding error from the right fielder to make it 3-1.

Webb would settle in after the shaky second, coming out to throw 3.2 scoreless innings and punching out seven more batters. But the Gamecocks only pieced together three hits over the last six innings, not giving any run support to the defense.

Aggie start Brigham Hill, who struck out six Gamecocks on May 13 in a 3-0 win, allowed just one run (unearned) on five hits. He also struck out eight batters. The Gamecocks as team struck out 10 times.

“That had nothing to do with our hitters,” Webb said. “They were taking some good swings. Hill did a great job. I’m faulting myself for that second inning. I came out after a first inning and was locating my pitches, made a few mistakes and they capitalized on them. Hats off to A&M for that.”

It seemed like every time the defense would make a great defensive play, the Gamecock offense would follow it up with a quick inning. After getting out of a runners on the corners, no outs jam in the fifth without giving up a run, the offense went three up, three down in the bottom of the inning, grounding out three times.

Hill threw six pitches in the inning. The bottom third of the South Carolina order—John Jones, TJ Hopkins (pinch-hitter), Chris Cullen, DC Arendas (pinch-hitter)—all combined to go 0-for-11 with seven strikeouts.

“We had some guys in there give us competitive at-bats but not enough,” Holbrook said. “We have to get back and work on that and put nine guys in the lineup that can give us competitive at-bats.”

After a five-error game Wednesday, the Gamecocks only committed one against Texas A&M, a throwing error from Josh Reagan in the ninth who was wild on a pickoff throw. The runner would move to third on the error and would come around to score.

South Carolina had more errors committed, six, than runs, five, in Hoover.

“I think number one we have to flush this,” outfielder Gene Cone said. “Like coach said, we have to get back to practice, work hard and just flush this. We have to move on to the next at-bat for each and everyone of us.”

The Gamecocks have now lost eight straight games in Hoover and are winless in the tournament since 2012. With the loss, many national writers have the team on the outside looking in for a national seed. National seeds host both regionals and superregionals.

National seeds, as well as the rest of the 64-team field, will be announced on Monday, but until then all the Gamecocks can about seeding is wait.

“I’m sure our RPI will be in the top 10 and when you’re in the top 10, you’re in the conversation,” Holbrook said. “We were in the conversation before this weekend and we’ll be in the conversation after this weekend. If you’re in the top 10 in RPI and are SEC East champs, you should be in the conversation.”

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