Clemson baseball suffering from midseason slump

For the first time this season, Clemson coach Monte Lee’s squad is in a hole.

Can the Tigers, who went 1-3 last week, dig their way out?

They were swept at Louisville over the weekend to fall to 8-10 in ACC play, their worst conference start since 2008. Clemson didn’t make the NCAA tournament that year, and to keep history from repeating itself, the Tigers, who were also swept last month at Miami, have to figure out how to get back to winning ACC series in a hurry.

After dropping two of three at Duke the previous week, Lee’s team could not win a game at No. 11 Louisville.

Clemson (24-12 overall) sits fifth in the ACC’s Atlantic Division behind the Cardinals, FSU, N.C. State and Notre Dame. Just one game ahead of Wake Forest and two games from last-place Boston College, the Tigers still have to play three teams directly in front of them.

It was an especially difficult week for Clemson’s starting pitchers. Jake Higginbotham gave up three runs on five hits and three walks in just four innings of work Tuesday against Western Carolina. That helped put the Tigers in a 6-3 hole, but they were able to rally for a 7-6 victory.

Against Louisville, Clate Schmidt, Charlie Barnes and Alex Eubanks combined to allow 12 earned runs on 25 hits, running the weekend rotation’s earned run average up to 4.85 on the year.

Offensively, Clemson had just two hits in the first loss to Louisville and 11 in the second with just four total runs scored. The bats got going in the finale with eight runs on seven hits, but the Tigers, who average 6.6 runs per game, have been held to four runs or less in six of the their last nine games. Freshman Seth Beer, who’s hitting .417, had six hits and four RBIs on the week and hit his team-leading 14th home run.

Defensively, Clemson committed 11 errors in four games.

Clemson begins a 13-game homestand Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. against Georgia, a squad the Tigers beat 11-6 in Athens on April 5. The Bulldogs (20-17) won a series over South Carolina over the weekend.

This story was originally published April 18, 2016 at 11:36 PM with the headline "Clemson baseball suffering from midseason slump."