D1Baseball weighs in on South Carolina baseball's hosting chances
South Carolina is gearing up for a big series this weekend at Founders Park. And both the Gamecocks and the national media understand what it can do for the team’s hosting resume.
Taking two wins over Tennessee this weekend at home would almost certainly give the Gamecocks a top 16 seed. And D1Baseball’s staff agrees.
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“I do like the 18-12 against the top 50 as well. They’re 15-11 in the league. That’s comparable to Kentucky,” Aaron Fitt said on the D1Baseball podcast this week. “Gamecocks have Tennessee at home, obviously a big series. It’s huge. And Tennessee hasn’t won a series on the road. If we think South Carolina holds serve, gets to 17-12 in the league that’s probably enough to slot in there.”
Fitt and the D1Baseball crew have South Carolina hosting a regional, the No. 11 seed currently. That includes North Carolina, Southern Cal and Central Connecticut State projected to travel there.
It’s paired with the West Virginia regional that includes Tennessee, Notre Dame and Rider.
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Baseball America as South Carolina the No. 13 overall seed hosting Duke Texas Tech and Mercer. It’s paired there with a regional including No. 4 LSU, Southern Miss, TCU and Nicholls State.
One of the big thing D1Baseball mentioned was the Gamecocks’ strength of schedule while drawing a tough challenge from the SEC West.
South Carolina not only had to play the East teams, which includes the better teams in the SEC this season. But the Gamecocks drew all three of the best teams in the West standings this season in Arkansas, LSU and Auburn then Mississippi State.
Entering the final weekend of the regular season the Gamecocks are 10-5 in the SEC East and 5-6 versus the SEC West.
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“One of the things to mention about South Carolina–we talk about how big these conferences are and unbalanced schedules–they have played all of the good teams in the West. They played LSU, they played Arkansas and they played Auburn. You only get to play (four) and they played arguably three of the top ones,” Mark Etheridge said on the podcast.
“It’s a challenging schedule. It’s the most challenging schedule an SEC team played interconference. Whether the committee picks up on that, maybe they do now. It’s part of that math when you try to evaluate those teams.”
The Gamecocks’ metrics entering Friday’s doubleheader–No. 5 in the RPI and also No. 7 strength of schedule–are hosting material and now they have to get the win total to same spot.
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This weekend’s series will go a long way in that while series win could give South Carolina some good momentum heading into the SEC Tournament.
First pitch for Friday’s doubleheader is at 3 p.m. with game two kicking off an hour after game one ends. The series finale will air on the SEC Network at 2 p.m.
