Georgia fends off South Carolina in high-scoring affair
There aren’t many weak spots in Georgia’s lineup right now. Even outside of lethal slugger Charlie Condon, the Bulldogs have five other players hitting above .300. There’s not really any easy outs.
And South Carolina (33-16, 13-12 SEC) learned this very quickly on Thursday night. The No. 15 Bulldogs made a big statement and picked up a 14-10 win over No. 13 South Carolina in the critical series opener.
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With Ty Good awaiting in the bullpen from the first pitch, Roman Kimball got the start on the mound and didn’t have it. After a leadoff walk, the right-hander got a taste of the Condon experience as he served up an RBI double on a 1-1 pitch.
“He just leaves too many balls up,” head coach Mark Kingston said. “Roman needs to pitch up in the zone but not above the zone — there’s a big difference. When he’s above the zone, he walks guys. When he’s at the top of the strike zone, he gets a lot of fly balls and swings and misses. There’s a fine line between that.”
Later in the frame, he gave up a three-run homer, which quickly ended his night after recording only one out. Fortunately, things calmed down as Good came in and got the final two outs.
Needing to respond quickly, South Carolina wasted no time getting to Georgia left-hander Jarvis Evans. The Gamecocks scored three runs with the big hit off the bat of Kennedy Jones, a two-run single into left. Just like that, this now felt like a game that would feature a plethora of scoring.
And it would as the Dawgs continued to rake at the plate. In the second, Good walked the leadoff man and then allowed a two-run homer deep into right. Condon, who could’ve easily been walked with the bases cleared, instead was pitched to and crushed his 34th homer of the year.
“Well, he’s the best hitter in the country right now, and he’s seeing the ball really well. He sees the ball really well,” Kingston said. “He seems to be on a lot of different pitches. He was 2-for-4 tonight so he was a little bit above what he normally does. He usually hits .470 so. You can’t walk him every time. He’s a really good hitter and we’ll continue to pick our spots with him.”
After this, Good really settled in and pitched much better the rest of the night. He’d end up tossing four innings, giving up four runs on five hits. But he struck out seven and walked two, which was enough to at least give the Gamecocks a chance.
“Ty pitched well. But 86 pitches in four innings, we’ve got to be creative with our guys,” Kingston said. “The old days of guys throwing seven or eight innings on 100 pitches, that’s not anywhere anymore. Their guy threw 105 pitches, the second guy that came in and threw five innings. Baseball culture is now you’ve got to be creative. And so, we’ll continue to look for the best ways to use our pitchers. I thought Ty did a good job. So we’re just going to have to continue to be creative and maybe find unconventional ways to piece our pitching together.”
However, South Carolina couldn’t keep up at the same pace. The offense plated another run in the third to cut the deficit down to three. But besides that, it was a struggle to bring runs across.
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With his pitch count climbing, Good’s outing came to an end with one out in the fifth. Although there were multiple pitchers warming up in the bullpen throughout the game, Tyler Dean was the next to come out. And that move proved to backfire as he gave up a long three-run homer into left just two batters into his outing. It’d only get worse from there as Georgia built its lead up to 12-4 by the sixth.
South Carolina would answer back with three runs in the sixth after loading the bases with no outs. However, just like before, the Dawgs answered right back in the next inning, as Tre Phelps launched his second homer of the game. This time, he hit a two-run shot to make it a 14-7 game.
To the Gamecocks’ credit, though, they continued to battle and brought three more runs across in the eighth. Jones got the scoring started with an RBI double into left, his fourth hit of the game. Dalton Reeves followed with a two-run single into left.
Despite its best efforts, South Carolina couldn’t do much more damage after that. In the ninth, the Gamecocks went down in order to drop the opener.
Up next: South Carolina will look to even the series with Georgia on Friday. First pitch is at 5:30 p.m. on SEC Network. Eli Jones (3-3, 4.53 ERA) will make the start on the mound.
