Down to final out, South Carolina rallies to walk off Florida in 14-inning thriller
South Carolina baseball’s turn was going to have to start Friday night.
The No. 25 Gamecocks came in having won two in a row, a Sunday victory to avoid a sweep against Vanderbilt and a midweek win. But after six consecutive losses, to start an absolutely brutal 11-game stretch, this weekend’s series to open the home SEC season had to be a chance to salvage something.
They got the offense they needed early, and the heroics came early Saturday morning with a 9-8 walk-off, extra-inning victory over the No. 5 Florida Gators.
And what heroics they were.
Andrew Eyster launched a two-out blast into the Gamecocks bullpen after Florida took a lead in the top of the 14th. Collin Burgess blasted a double to plate Jeff Heinrich to end the affair that stretched past 5 1/2 hours.
That came two hours and three minutes after Braylen Wimmer capped a three-run rally with an RBI double. The man he drove in: Burgess.
“Honestly, I forgot I even scored the game-tying run,” Burgess said. “I was getting tired, not gonna lie.”
Asked if he’d ever been part of a game like that, Burgess said absolutely not. His coach, Mark Kingston, said he only felt disbelief as Eyster’s bomb sailed into the ‘pen.
Burgess wouldn’t have had either chance had USC center fielder Brady Allan not launched headlong into the wall next to the Gamecocks (14-6, 2-2 SEC) bullpen in the top of the eighth, appearing to hurt himself while robbing the Gators (16-6, 3-1 SEC) of a run scoring hit and ending the inning.
It was the team’s longest game since 2014. That game was a 3-2 win against Tennessee.
On Friday, South Carolina tagged Gators ace Tommy Mace for four runs in the second, but USC’s pitching could not make that hold.
Thomas Farr stood at 105 pitches after issuing a pair of fifth-inning walks with the Gamecocks clinging to a 4-3 lead. Pitching coach Skylar Meade ventured out to the mound, had a discussion long enough to draw the home plate umpire out to break it up and ultimately returned to the dugout without a change.
Farr gave up two singles, one with an 0-2 count, which plated a pair of runs. South Carolina trailed by as many as three runs before grinding back in with seventh inning runs off the bats of Josiah Sightler and Andrew Eyster.
Gamecocks pitching struggled through the early part of the night, handing out nine walks in the first three innings. At one point, USC had a 10-4 lead in hits, but found itself trailing by a run. Kingston’s team left six runners on during the first four innings.
The Gamecocks bullpen allowed two hits in the final seven innings. Julian Bosnic (2-1) got the win with five strikeouts in two innings. He replaced Andrew Peters, who tossed four innings and 77 pitches of one-hit ball.
Ben Specht took the loss, his first decision of the year.
In the inning the Gamecocks got to Mace, Jeff Heinrich, Josiah Sightler and Wimmer all had singles to drive in runs. The four runs tied Mace’s high allowed for the year. He’d not allowed more than that since the end of the 2019 season.
The win is South Carolina’s second in a row against a top-five opponent. In a year where five teams the Gamecocks play occupy the top five spots in Baseball America’s rankings, the going is never going to be easy.
But Friday night, the Gamecocks and Mark Kingston chipped away a little. It was neither easy, not pretty, but starting to turn things rarely is.
“This is a good baseball team” Kingston said. “We played a heck of a schedule, but I think it prepared us for tonight.
“We had the will to keep going and never gave up. That’s built through challenging your team.”
South Carolina vs Florida baseball series
▪ Game 2 at 4 pm Saturday on SEC Network Plus
▪ Game 3 at noon Sunday on SEC Network
This story was originally published March 27, 2021 at 12:38 AM.