How South Carolina baseball ‘made it easy’ for this talented SEC transfer to commit
Auburn outfielder Bristol Carter, was the 21st new transfer to announce their commitment to South Carolina baseball after he made the announcement on Monday.
Carter was the third transfer prospect to announce his commitment to head coach Kevin Schnall and the Gamecocks that day.
His recruitment moved lightning fast. Carter, who entered the portal on June 11, said he first heard from Schnall’s coaching staff on Sunday night. The two sides spoke on the phone Monday morning and by 5:51 p.m. Carter had announced he was committed to the Gamecocks.
Carter, who is from Oak Ridge, North Carolina and started his career at East Carolina, said a previous relationship with USC’s new hitting coach Bill Cilento helped expedite the process.
“It was very quick. They made it easy,” Carter told The State on Tuesday. “I talked to them Monday, and I was like, ‘I’ve always had interest in you guys,’ and everything lined up. Me and Coach Cilento have had a relationship for going on three years now. He recruited me out of high school and when I hopped in the portal after ECU he recruited me then. I’ve always enjoyed the coaches. And Coach Schnall, the way he coaches, just fits my character, fits my style of play.”
Simply put, Carter feels South Carolina is the perfect fit for him and “exactly” what he was looking for. In 2025, Auburn was eliminated from the NCAA Tournament Super Regionals by Schnall and Coastal Carolina. A year later, Carter remembers seeing the way the Chanticleers responded to the coach in the dugout and kept it in mind during his portal recruitment process.
“His character and the way he coaches…I could just see the way the guys handled it, and the way the players handled it at Coastal,” Carter said. “The way they were was just something I wanted to be a part of.”
Bristol Carter’s baseball career at Auburn and ECU
Carter comes to South Carolina after two seasons at Auburn and one at ECU. He earned Freshman All-American honors from Perfect Game in 2024 after posting an impressive .346 batting average for the Pirates.
In 2025, Carter’s first year at Auburn, his numbers dipped a bit. He hit .243 that year and had a .667 OPS. But this past season, Carter found some rhythm and got his numbers back up. Carter is coming off a 2026 season in which he tallied 45 hits and a .298 batting average. His OPS of .812 was nearly a career-high.
“Just being able to kind of free up and not really care about the outcome or my personal stats just be able to do whatever I can for the team,” Carter said of what made the difference. “...I just put my nose down and went to work. And at the end of the year, if my stats were good, they were good, if they were bad, they were bad. I only cared about helping the team and doing whatever it can do for the team to win.”
Perhaps the most eye-popping thing on Carter’s stat line is his stolen base numbers. Carter brings 49 career steals with him to Columbia. He started off slow, recording just four in his lone year at ECU. Then in 2025 he led Auburn with 14 steals.
This past season Carter stole a whopping 31 bases. He was caught stealing just once. Carter’s 31 steals was tied for No. 3 in the SEC and more than the total compiled by all of South Carolina’s players in 2026.
Fitting in at South Carolina
Those sorts of numbers fit right in with the “Schnall Ball” philosophy being implemented at South Carolina under the new coaching staff.
“My goal leading into the past year was just to find a way to get on first base and cause havoc on the base paths,” Carter said. “I studied the game a little more. I studied the pitchers more and the way they pitched, and the way their pick-off moves were. Just to be able to help me steal, and maybe even get an extra foot on the lead, and help me steal the base. That was something for me that I took pride [in].”
There are still several months before Carter ever wears a South Carolina uniform, but he said he’s already excited about the prospect of helping turn the Gamecocks program around. Carter will be playing his fourth season of college baseball in 2027 and hopes to bring leadership value to a new-look South Carolina roster in Schnall’s first season as head coach.
“I’ve had experience in the SEC, so these guys coming from, whether it’s Coastal or another league, [I can] be that guy to help them lead, and help lead them through it to the toughest conference in college baseball,” Carter said.
