Gamecocks drop into Hoover loser's bracket with 10-3 loss to LSU

HOOVER, Ala. — In a battle of bullpens, South Carolina’s cracked first.

The first game of the double-elimination portion of the SEC Tournament between No. 6 seed South Carolina and No. 3 seed LSU came down to relief pitching, and LSU won the battle for a 10-3 victory.

South Carolina (39-18) is now in the loser’s bracket, meaning it will play the first game of the day again tomorrow at 10:30 a.m. ET Thursday against the loser of Wednesday’s Arkansas vs. Texas A&M clash.

"When both teams had to go to the bullpen, that's when it changed," Mark Kingston said. "We were very inconsistent out of the bullpen. I thought the guys that came in made some big pitches, but my message to the team afterwards was it's got to be about consistency."

Eli Jones started on the mound for the Gamecocks and outside of giving up a two-run home run to Brayden Jobert in the second inning, he battled effectively through a difficult spot. Jones was pitching on two days shorter rest than usual against one of the toughest lineups in the nation and gave South Carolina four innings with just the two runs allowed on three hits to that point, but the outing got away from him in the fifth.

After Ethan Petry hit a solo home run off LSU starter Thatcher Hurd leading off the top of the fifth — the first baserunner of the game for South Carolina — the Tigers went back to work offensively.

"I'm feeling pretty good right now," Petry said. "I've been struggling lately, and I just kept working hard and trusting my teammates around me, and just kept the course, and now I'm getting back to it and just looking forward to the next game."

Back-to-back singles leading off the bottom of the fifth knocked Jones out, and Nick Proctor was up first in relief. The California transfer struggled though, walking multiple batters in an outing for the first time all season. Both walks came with the bases loaded after a Dylan Crews single, forcing in two runs. LSU tacked on two more runs with sacrifice flies to take a 6-1 lead, forcing a situation where it looked like the Gamecocks would choose to preserve arms for tomorrow.

"Proctor has been tremendous for us all year," Kingston said. "Just didn't have it today. For whatever reason, just he wasn't throwing with the command that he usually does. It's going to happen at times. Hasn't happened very often for him, but it did today."

The offense did put two runs back on the board with a pair of bases loaded walks of its own thanks to Petry and Talmadge LeCroy, but LSU reliever Nate Ackenhausen came on to strand the bases loaded with a strikeout and a tapper back to the mound. And once LSU’s offense answered with two more runs off Jackson Phipps in the sixth to extend the lead back out to five, the air was out of the South Carolina balloon for the day.

Some of it evaporated early in the game when starting catcher Cole Messina left the game. He took a foul tip to the mask in the second inning and was able to finish the frame, but left the game with a trainer before the bottom of the third started. Jonathan French spent the remainder of the game behind the plate. Kingston said he was in concussion protocol, with his status for the remainder in the week still up in the air.

LSU scored two more runs in the seventh inning off Brett Thomas on RBI singles from Crews and Tommy White.

Kingston did not name a starting pitcher for Thursday's game, saying the coaching staff would have to go back to the hotel and "come up with something later on."

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