Gamecocks Overpower Gators

Gator Baseball ran out of luck on St. Patrick’s Day against the South Carolina Gamecocks. Though the Gators won Friday’s game 7-3, USC controlled Saturday’s 15-7 ball game against Florida. Going into the game, the all-time series was tied at 45-45 between the two, however, now the Gamecocks owns the series 46-45. Saturday’s game was full of homers with Florida and USC both earning four home runs each. In the game, Florida had 10 hits for 7 runs and 4 walks. While South Carolina had 16 hits for 15 runs and five walks.

Gamecock Dominance

Starting pitcher for the Gators, Jackson Kowar struggled early against South Carolina. In the first inning, USC’s Noah Campbell stirred up some controversy, when he hit a fly ball to the right field walk. Campbell tried to turn it into an in-the-park homerun, and was initially called out at home, but it was overturned to put the Gamecocks on the board. Then right after, Stokes for USC hit a RBI homerun to right field, to make the score 3-0 Gamecocks.

Kowar's not fooling anyone so far…two home runs in the first three batters and South Carolina leads 3-0, B1.

— Florida Gators Baseball (@GatorsBB) March 17, 2018

Cody Morris pitched a solid game for South Carolina, before being replaced in the middle of the 6th inning. Morris recorded a career high 10 strikeouts. He also only gave up 4 hit, 2 walks and 2 runs.

Still in the 6th, Tolbert of USC singled back to the pitcher, but Tommy Mace couldn’t get a handle on it and USC scored. After, the Gamecocks loaded the bases and Bride of USC hit a ground-rule double to right center. Then, a single to center field put two more runs on the board to make the score 9-2 USC.

Gators Tried Come Back

The Gators made a good attempt to come back towards the end of the game. Even hitting four homeruns. In the 7th, Nick Horvath hit a bomb over the right field wall and Wil Dalton, followed up with his second homer in the game to left center field. This brought the score up 9-5 USC.

https://twitter.com/SarahCarlieUF/status/975145702903943168

The 7th inning showed promise, but in the 8th inning, the Gamecocks bought a better insurance policy by knocking in two more runs. It didn’t end there though, USC hit back to back homers to make the score 15-6 USC.

In the 9th, Florida couldn’t covert enough runs and after a solo homer from Jonathan India the final score was 15-7 USC.

O’Sullivan Thoughts

After the game Kevin O’Sullivan emphasized how the boys battled throughout the game. “We played from behind since the first inning, but I thought our offense was really good today. We had a situation where we got the tying run to the plate in the eighth inning, they fought the entire day.- O’Sullivan

Going For The Series

With the series 1-1 the Gators will be looking to take the series Sunday in South Carolina at 1 p.m. on ESPNU.