Gamecocks homer five times to seal sweep of No. 5 Florida
When No. 25 South Carolina was playing its best baseball early in the season, the winning formula was simple: power on the mound and power at the plate.
In recent weekends, USC pitchers continued to deliver, but the Gamecocks’ bats cooled against the likes of Texas ace Ty Madden and Vanderbilt flamethrowers Kumar Rocker and Jack Leiter. As a result, the team dropped back-to-back weekend series.
This weekend, the Gamecocks rediscovered their offensive muscle — and they used it to sweep Florida in a three-game series for the first time since 2006.
USC clubbed five home runs on Sunday alone, defeating the No. 5 Gators, 8-5, to seal a blue-chip SEC sweep in emphatic fashion.
“We all know for 20 years Florida’s had some of the best pitching in the country. Just like last week, Vanderbilt has some of the best pitching in the country. And the week before, Texas has for 50 years had the best pitching in the country, so I just think you’re seeing guys have gotten better because it’s all they see now,” head coach Mark Kingston said. “It just we’re facing the best pitchers in the country, and you just hope that what you get out of that is guys get more comfortable with that velocity and they get a better feel for what it takes to hit it.”
The same cast of characters who fueled South Carolina (16-6, 4-2 SEC) to 11 straight wins to start the season once again rose to the occasion for Kingston’s club throughout the weekend — namely veterans Andrew Eyster, Wes Clarke and Brady Allen.
Eyster, who had two walk-off hits in USC’s series win against Clemson earlier in the season, hit a two-run, game-tying blast in the 14th inning of Friday’s thriller. And Clarke, the nation’s leader in home runs (13), hit the go-ahead three-run homer to put away Florida on Saturday.
On Sunday, the duo hit back-to-back solo shots in the second inning to tie the game and then take the lead, and the Gamecocks never looked back from there. Taking advantage of the wind blowing out to right field, the Gamecocks added three more solo shots, with catcher Colin Burgess also homering in the second inning and with Allen homering twice.
Allen said the Gamecocks tweaked their offensive formula heading into the weekend, with batters moving closer to the plate in order to take away the outside corner from pitchers. The Gamecocks let the ball travel deep into the zone and pounded the ball to the opposite field.
“Going up there with the new game plan hitting — I mean hitting is already hard enough — so going up there and actually see it working and you’re succeeding, it’s a great feeling,” Allen said. “... We can continue to do that. I have total faith in our hitters, and I knew it was there all along with our offense. But we might have not showed it early, but definitely I think we can continue to do it against any pitching.”
Those runs were more than enough for the USC pitching staff, which pieced together a combined effort between freshman right-hander Will Sanders, left-hander Julian Bosnic and closer Brett Kerry. The trio combined for 14 strikeouts and just two walks.
The Gators tagged Kerry for two runs in the top of the eighth inning on a two-out double by catcher Nathan Hickey, but Kerry regrouped to throw a scoreless ninth inning.
“Coming into today we knew we won the series, but everyone wanted that Game 3 win,” said Bosnic, who threw three scoreless innings in relief of Sanders. “We all still battled, and we didn’t have the mindset of laying back. We wanted to get on top of them early, which we did. And it’s just a really good feeling. Just a great team win.”
Next USC baseball game
Who: No. 25 South Carolina (16-6, 4-2 SEC) vs. Gardner-Webb (6-9, 5-4)
When: Tuesday at 7 p.m.
Where: Founders Park in Columbia
Watch: Streaming on SEC Network Plus
This story was originally published March 28, 2021 at 2:38 PM with the headline "Gamecocks homer five times to seal sweep of No. 5 Florida."
