South Carolina drops final home game of 2022

The South Carolina crowd fell silent as the ball cleared the yard. The only sound came from Charlotte’s dugout.

The roar continued as Will Butcher rounded third, flexed and stepped on home plate while celebrating his grand slam.

It’s a home run that not only put South Carolina, which entered the inning up three runs, down five but effectively killed any at-large tournament chances for the Gamecocks as part of an 8-3 drubbing Tuesday night.

“I mean every loss stings throughout the year. I can go back to a number of losses throughout the year that felt like wins. They all sting,” Mark Kingston said. “Tonight’s one of those that stung. You just have to move on.”

It’s South Carolina’s sixth loss to a non-power conference team this season. The Gamecocks have now lost five midweek games as their RPI dips into the 70s.

South Carolina likely has to win the SEC Tournament to make the NCAA Tournament.

“Just win games. We have three regular-season games left,” Mark Kingston said. “We need to go win, bottom line.”

Things looked great for South Carolina (26-25, 12-14 SEC) early, playing three runs over the first four innings while also getting a great outing from starter Matthew Becker.

Becker motored through four no-hit innings, walking three and pitching out of a few jams with four strikeouts.

But he hit 60 pitches after four innings and things began to unravel in the fifth.

“Zero thought,” Kingston said on taking Becker out of the game. “That was the very high end of what we were comfortable with. We wanted him to get us off to a good start, which he did. He needs to be available for the Florida series and then for the SEC Tournament.”

Aidan Hunter faced four batters and didn’t record an out. He gave up a two-run homer, a double and a pair of singles before leaving the game.

Parker Coyne proceeded to walk in the go-ahead run, his third of three straight walks, before giving up the grand slam to Butcher.

It was as nightmare an inning as the Gamecocks could have. Charlotte plated eight runs on five hits while also sending 11 to the plate.

“They just made some bad pitches,” Kingston said. “When you leave the ball in the middle of the plate to good, powerful hitters and strong hitters like that you get hurt.”

South Carolina couldn’t answer back, drying up offensively after wasting another opportunity in the fourth.

The Gamecocks just plated their third run of the day, a Braylen Wimmer RBI double, and had him on third with just one out.

But Jalen Vasquez and Talmadge LeCroy couldn’t drive him in and things weren’t the same after that at the plate.

After Wimmer’s double, Charlotte retired the next 10 batters before a Talmadge LeCroy two-run double in the seventh. The Gamecocks only had base runners the final five innings, LeCroy and a two-out double from Michael Braswell in the ninth.

“We talk about it all the time with pitching versus hitting and matchups and sinker ballers versus a four-seam guy,” Kingston said. “There are some pitchers we do a nice job (against) and some pitchers who have our number based on the personnel we have. He came in and did a nice job.”

South Carolina will also need to win two of three at Florida to finish better than .500 in the regular season.

“Eleven o’clock bus ride tomorrow. Be ready to go,” Kingston said. “It’s Gamecocks versus Gators. That’s special baseball, so be ready to go.”