Gamecocks use power bats, strong pitching to claim Opening Day rout over Dayton
After 346 days away, Opening Day may not have carried quite the same energy for South Carolina baseball on Friday, with the crowd at Founders Park reduced to a quarter of its usual size due to COVID-19 restrictions.
But by the end of the first inning, the No. 18 Gamecocks had the fans buzzing anyway, and they didn’t let up en route to an easy 12-1 win over Dayton to start the 2021 season.
“Good opening night. Obviously that’s how we wanted to play,” USC coach Mark Kingston said. “Saw a lot of good things out of our team.”
Junior designated hitter Wes Clarke, who was leading the SEC in home runs last year when the season was abruptly canceled, provided much of the early buzz. After a walk and a single put two aboard early in the bottom of the first, Clarke clobbered a three-run home run 391 feet to deep center to put USC up before it had even recorded an out.
That turned out to be all the support redshirt junior Thomas Farr needed — he hit 97 miles per hour on the stadium radar gun early, and that velocity, combined with swing-and-miss offspeed stuff, kept Dayton off-balance most of the game. Farr struck out eight Flyers over six innings, giving up five hits and just one earned run, a solo home run in the sixth.
“The emotions were definitely high because as we’ve seen, it’s been a long time since I’ve been able to pitch in a full season,” Farr said of when he first took the mound. “So it’s always an adrenaline rush to be able to pitch, and to be able to pitch at the University of South Carolina’s Friday night starter, it’s such an honor to do that on Opening Day.”
As honored as Farr was to get the ball on Friday, Kingston said he showed “exactly what you want” out of an ace. On a pitch count as he eases into the season, Farr only needed 89 throws to get through six innings.
“Farr did everything you want on a Friday night. He had great stuff, he commanded the baseball, he was efficient with his pitches,” Kingston said.
But even though Farr didn’t need any more runs than he got in the first inning, the Gamecocks gave him more.
In the third inning, junior right fielder Brady Allen led off with a triple, followed by a pair of walks to load the bases, and senior left fielder Andrew Eyster cleared them all by smacking one into the opposite field bullpen for a grand slam.
“Just seeing the ball well. That’s something, first game of the season, a lot of times it takes a little bit to kind of get in a groove and see the ball well. But I don’t know, I just felt like I was seeing the ball for a while and didn’t swing at bad pitches,” Eyster said.
Kingston was particularly pleased that the homer came with Eyster facing an 0-2 count.
“I thought our at-bats with two strikes were really good all night, and it’s something that we’ve worked very hard on with this group, and they’ve really bought into it. So that was something I was really happy to see
All told, nine of South Carolina’s 15 hits on the game went for extra bases, with Allen doubling twice to go with his triple, Eyster tripling to go with his homer and Clarke doubling in addition to his long ball. That trio accounted for nine of Carolina’s RBIs and eight of their runs.
“Those three guys really stood out tonight. Just gave us tremendously mature at-bats, and they looked like the big-time guys that we know they are,” Kingston said.
Meanwhile, Dayton could get nothing going against a series of three talented freshman pitchers the Gamecocks trotted out in relief of Farr. Magdiel Cotto, Jackson Phipps and Jack Mahoney combined to toss three scoreless frames, giving up just one hit between them.
NEXT USC BASEBALL GAME
Who: South Carolina (1-0) vs. Dayton (0-1)
When: 1 p.m. Saturday
Where: Founders Park
Watch: Streaming online on SEC Network Plus via WatchESPN
This story was originally published February 19, 2021 at 6:49 PM.
