Gamecocks walk it off again, take series over Clemson
For the second time this weekend, Andrew Eyster sent Clemson fans home unhappy.
The Gamecock slugger laced his second-walk off double of the weekend in the ninth inning of Sunday's game, sealing an 8-7 South Carolina win and a victory in the series for the first time since 2019.
His hit Sunday comes a day after he hit another walk-off double to clinch game one, and Sunday's was eerily similar to the one less than 24 hours after it.
“It means so much. It means more to me the longer I’m here and the longer I get to realize what this rivalry means to former players, current players, fans, alumni. To be able to help the team win those first two games and clinch the series it means a lot,” Eyster said postgame. “I’m glad we could make a lot of people’s days.”
Sunday's game turned into a heavyweight bout with the teams trading body blow after body blow before Eyster's decisive hit with two outs in the ninth.
Clemson took a slim two-run lead in the fifth, using a two-run double off Jack Mahoney to do it, but the Gamecocks quickly stormed back with four runs in the bottom of the inning.
Braylen Wimmer led things off with a home run to center before Wes Clarke jacked a three-run shot to center as well, his second homer of the day to push his season total to a whopping eight through six games.
“I don’t want to talk about it too much. It almost feels like talking about a no-hitter in the seventh inning. I’m not going to do it. I’m just not going to do it,” Kingston said. “He's a great kid that loves the big moment.”
It wouldn't last before Clemson scored four in the seventh, but like they had all game South Carolina came back to tie things in the bottom of the inning with back-to-back RBI singles from David Mendham and Eyster, with Eyster's hit tying the game in that inning.
South Carolina (6-0) trailed three separate times and all three times they'd come back to either tie the game or take a lead.
"We play for each other and we know if someone goes down or someone doesn’t have a good at-bat we’ll pick them up," Allen said. "That happened with Danny Lloyd. We know next time he’ll go out and shove but we picked him up, scored some runs and had his back.”
Eyster finished with three hits, including his game-winning double, with two runs driven in and is hitting .393 on the short season so far.
Eyster's hit was eerily similar to his one Saturday night with Brady Allen and Wes Clarke getting on base and Eyster delivered, launching a "voluptuous" fastball to right field and scoring Allen for the second time in two days.
“I knew where the outfielders were playing and as soon as he hit it I knew it was down. I tried to throw my helmet over the backstop and it slipped," Allen said. "Maybe if I get another chance we can do that. It’s unreal joy. He ran so far I was out of breath trying to chase him in the outfield.”
After Lloyd gave up the go-ahead runs for Clemson in the top of the seventh, the Gamecock bullpen clamped down, pitching two scoreless innings to end the game behind dominant pitching from Andy Peters and Will Sanders.
Peters came in for Lloyd and, after a run scored on the first batter he faced, he settled in for two scoreless innings where he gave up one hit and struck out four of the eight batters he faced.
His biggest inning came in the eighth when, after South Carolina tied things up, he mowed through the top of Clemson's lineup for a perfect inning inning in what Kingston called an "outstanding" outing.
“He’s starting to come into his own. He’s starting to get comfortable. He was a guy that wasn’t comfortable out there for a while but appears to be getting comfortable getting outs and using himself and controlling his heartbeat. He was huge for us,” Kingston said. “We need him to be that.”
Freshman Will Sanders came up huge again, coming in with one out and two runners on but got a groundout and a fly out to end the threat, aided by a nice play at second from Braylen Wimmer.
Sanders has pitched out of two huge late-inning jams in back-to-back games, getting out of a two on, no one out jam in the 11th Saturday, saying pitching in atmosphere's like this is "why I came to Columbia."
"Once that first pitch came out of my hand I was ready to go, ready to compete," he said. "Today, hearing Miley Cyrus with some Hoedown Throwdown was great to get my nerves out and ready to have fun. Miley Cyrus helps with the translucency of the ball.”
The Gamecocks have now won the first two games of the series, the first time a team's done that in this rivalry weekend since 2014.
“We didn’t play a perfect game, but you can’t question the heart," Kingston said. "We’ve had a couple opportunities to show what we’re made of and the team’s come through with flying colors.”
