By Sinderella
South Carolina came into the weekend losing three of its last four games and hoped to turn things around. Unfortunately, due to slow offensive starts, which have haunted the Gamecocks the past week, the Gamecocks went down 4-0 and 3-0 after thefirst inning on both Friday and Saturday.
South Carolina managed to limit the damage by Texas A&M throughout the rest of the games after the first few innings and was then able to go toe-to-toe with Texas A&M; but it wasn't enough, as Texas A&M won the first two games 9-2 and 6-3.
Eli Jones, who has been one of the best pitchers in the SEC, got hit around for the first time all season in Game One. Tyler Pitzer, who had a breakout performance versus Vanderbilt, ended up getting hit around for the second weekend in a row. It was a bad matchup for the two RHP versus a heavy lefty lineup, and Texas A&M took advantage of it. Even though Jones and Pitzer struggled, I still believe they should be the Friday and Saturday pitchers going forward, especially Jones, who is still one of the best in the SEC.
The roles were reversed for Game Three. South Carolina came out hot with a 2-run home run by Ethan Petry and another solo shot by Kennedy Jones early in the game. South Carolina took a 5-1 lead, and Matthew Becker was great in his first weekend start of the season, going 4.0 IP with 8 strikeouts and only 1 earned run. Texas A&M battled back but couldn't get enough offense to take the sweep, and South Carolina held on to win 6-5.
Matthew Becker has been great all season long, along with Ty Good, who came in Game Two and shut down Texas A&M. I believe one of them deserves to get the ball next Sunday, and I fully expect it to happen versus Florida. This next week is a huge week for South Carolina, as they host Top 25 team North Carolina for a midweek and travel to Florida for the weekend series. South Carolina has to go 2-2 at worst for to build momentum for the rest of the month, which does not get any easier.
(All pictures courtesy of @GamecockBll & @AggieBaseball)
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