USC's last series with Arkansas was all pitchers' duels. Why that won't happen again
Before the Presbyterian loss that came to mark the turning point in South Carolina baseball's season, the Gamecocks traveled to Fayetteville, Arkansas, in mid-April for a three-game set with the Razorbacks.
On Thursday, freshman Logan Chapman started the game for USC and went four innings, leading a surprising 3-2 win for the team. But after rain washed out the Friday game, Carolina's offense went dormant, scoring no runs in 14 innings across an abbreviated Saturday doubleheader to drop the series.
That April 12 win for South Carolina marked the last time Arkansas lost at home, and the only time this season an SEC team topped the Hogs at Baum Stadium.
Now, as coach Mark Kingston and squad prepare to return to that field for their NCAA tournament super regional, the regular season matchup is being re-evalutated by many hoping to gain some insight into how this weekend's series might play out.
But Kingston and his players say that regardless of result, these three games are likely to be far different from the ones nearly two months ago.
"The scores were very low — I believe it was 3-2, 2-0 and 3-0," Kingston said Wednesday. "They were tough conditions to hit in that weekend. It was very cold, it was very rainy most of that weekend, so to me it should be a much different series. Weather will be warmer, ball will carry much better so I think you'll see a bit more offense this weekend."
The Thursday matchup wasn't too cold — temperatures hovered just below 70 degrees, with high humidity — but the Saturday doubleheader took place in chilly, windy conditions, with temperatures dipping into the low 40s and gusts of wind reaching 25 miles per hour.
"That was tough. I think it was like under 40 degrees or something like that, it wasn't fun to play in. We just had to battle and obviously the conditions weren't nice," sophomore pitcher Cody Morris said. "Very possibly that's why it was low-scoring, but there's a lot of good pitchers between the two teams, so we'll see what happens."
For junior shortstop LT Tolbert, playing in the field and trying to hit was even harder with the cold.
"I think it was about 15 degrees with the wind chill," he said.
Arkansas does have one of the SEC's best pitching staffs, with a team ERA under 3.50 and two elite starters in juniors Blaine Knight and Kacey Murphy. But the Gamecocks' insistence that warmer weather will lead to more offense against the same players was backed up at the SEC tournament, when they lost to Arkansas, but by a score of 13-8, putting up five earned runs against Murphy in the process. The temperature then was 73 degrees.
It should be even hotter this weekend in Fayetteville, with highs around 90 degrees, and Baum Stadium will likely be full of Razorback fans excited by the possibility of a College World Series berth and maybe even a national title.
But don't count on USC being intimidated.
"They know us, we know them, and it's just a matter of who plays the best baseball. I don't think there's any edge for either side," Kingston said.
"We've played them well, and they've had some success against us this year, but we've matched up with them pretty well in every one of those games, so we have a lot of confidence," Tolbert said. "You've heard the saying it's tough to be teams three, four times in a year. Well, they've beat us three times, so I guess it's our time to go beat them twice."
Super Regional details
The South Carolina baseball team's Super Regional road trip to Arkansas will be a Saturday-Sunday-Monday series. Game times and TV networks are:
▪ Saturday: 6:30 p.m. — ESPN2
▪ Sunday: 3 p.m. — ESPN
▪ Monday: 7 p.m. — ESPN (if necessary)
This story was originally published June 6, 2018 at 11:54 PM with the headline "USC's last series with Arkansas was all pitchers' duels. Why that won't happen again."