South Carolina's NCAA Tournament regional final delayed by weather, pushed to Monday
South Carolina baseball's chance at an NCAA tournament regional championship will be delayed until Monday, as the Gamecocks' Sunday contest was postponed by poor weather in Greenville, North Carolina.
Host ECU and UNC-Wilmington started their elimination game at 2 p.m. Sunday but were delayed at roughly 3:20 p.m. by lightning in the area. The tarp was brought onto the field around 3:40 p.m. as rain and lightning pounded Clark-LeClair Stadium.
At 7:30 p.m., the NCAA announced the ECU-UNCW game would resume at 8:30 p.m. At 10:20 p.m., the NCAA pushed the game between South Carolina and Sunday's winner to 1 p.m. on Monday. The contest was originally scheduled for 6 p.m. Sunday.
The NCAA's manual states that "as a general guideline, no game should start later than 11 p.m. local time," and with the five-hour delay in the opening game, it was impossible for the Gamecocks to start at that time — at 10:05 p.m., the Seahawks and host Pirates were in the bottom of the seventh inning.
Should the winner of Sunday's game defeat South Carolina in the Monday early game, the teams would face off again in the afternoon at 5 p.m.
The overall winner of the regional will advance to a super regional against either Arkansas or Dallas Baptist — the Razorbacks lead the Patriots late and will secure their berth with a win.
-Greg Hadley
From earlier:
10:24p.m. Update: USC game officially postponed to 1 p.m. Monday. Game 2 would be at 5 p.m. Read more here.
10:13 p.m. Update: The expected deadline has been passed and still no word. Game on the field is in the top of the eighth.
9:03 p.m. Update: South Carolina's buses have pulled up to Clark-LaClair stadium. The game is still in the fifth as UNCW is mounting a rally.
8:30 p.m. Update: Baseball resumes. Top of the fourth, two outs, game has to finish before USC can go.
7:27 p.m. Update: The UNCW-ECU game is set to resume at 8:30 p.m. with more than 5 1/2 innings left. There would need to be 55 minutes between games and the NCAA discourages starting games after 11 p.m.
7:11 p.m. Update: Tarp comes off.
6:07 p.m. Update: It appears the rain has almost stopped. But there is a lot of water still out there and another five-plus innings to play in ECU-UNCW.
That South Carolina would again face a delay Sunday at the NCAA baseball tournament's Greenville N.C. Regional was almost a certainty.
It was all but assured well before the Gamecocks' first pitch.
Lightning interrupted the the noon elimination game to decide USC's opponen, which had already been moved back two hours because weather forced the Gamecocks and host ECU to play until past midnight on Saturday. The stoppage came at 3:22 p.m., and factoring in a mandated 55 minutes between games and rain that came around 4:20 p.m., that all but ensured South Carolina's start time would be pushed back.
The tarp was rolled out at 3:42 p.m. Incoming severe thunderstorms were announced just before 5 p.m. Then came sheets of rain and constant lightning strikes.
The lightning came in the top of the fourth of UNCW-East Carolina.
There had been a window for four hours between first pitch and South Carolina's 6 p.m. scheduled start, a gap unlikely to be enough, given most nine-inning games at the regional were pushing four hours.
USC's Saturday game started four hours late because of extra innings in the day's opening game and a pair of weather delays.
This story was originally published June 3, 2018 at 3:47 PM with the headline "South Carolina's NCAA Tournament regional final delayed by weather, pushed to Monday."