Clemson bats struggle as Tigers drop second straight game

CLEMSON — A 14-game winning streak for the Clemson baseball team to open the season has now been followed by back-to-back losses.

The Tigers suffered a 6-1 loss to Georgia State on Tuesday at Doug Kingsmore Stadium, two days after falling 5-3 to Northeastern.

Clemson had plenty of base runners but stranded 10 in the loss. Bryar Hawkins was 2-for-4 with an RBI but was the only Clemson batter to drive in a run or finish with multiple hits.

“Georgia State was the better club tonight,” Tigers coach Monte Lee said. “Their starting pitcher [Camren] Landry did a really good job, pitched out of some jams. We had runners on base. We had some opportunities early in the game to score some runs. We need to be able to hit with runners in scoring position and we just didn’t do that.”

Georgia State scored two runs in the first, one in the second and one in the third to go up 4-0, before Clemson scored its only run of the game in the bottom of the third.

Griffin Cheney did most of the damage at the plate for the Panthers, hitting three home runs in the game and driving in four.

Cheney homered in the first inning off Tigers starter Billy Barlow, the third inning off Clemson reliever Jackson Lindley and the eighth inning off Tigers reliever Alex Edmondson.

“Their four-hole guy killed us. That’s the bottom line,” Lee said. “We just didn’t execute pitches to a really good hitter. We knew he was a really good hitter. … We didn’t do a good job of executing pitches in two-strike counts against him and he made us pay.”

Up next, the Tigers host Miami in their ACC opener on Friday at 6 p.m.

Mack Anglin will get the start for Clemson. The redshirt sophomore enters the game 3-0 on the season.