Everything Paul Mainieri said after South Carolina's series loss to Oklahoma

Following a 6-5 loss to No. 12 Oklahoma on Sunday, South Carolina head coach Paul Mainieri spoke to the media. Here’s everything he had to say.

Opening statement

“Well, that was a bitter pill to swallow. I thought that for most of the game, we played well enough to win. Had a chance. But a couple of things, I think, you know, ended up being our demise. We had opportunities to score more runs earlier in the game. We didn’t take advantage of a couple of opportunities and kept them in the game. And then, of course, the seventh inning, we walked the first two guys to the inning with a two-run lead. That normally doesn’t turn out well for you, but then we got the lead and had a chance to close them out. Tough lineup. When we got the leadoff hitter to pop up in the ninth inning to lead off the inning, I felt pretty good about our chances, but it just didn’t happen for us. They tied the game, and then I thought, what was going to be a routine fly ball to centerfield, just kept blowing with the wind and went out of the ballpark. And we had a chance even in the bottom of the ninth, ending there, and it was at the 10th inning, and just couldn’t get him across. So we just gotta take it like men and look forward to Tuesday night.”

Did you have any thoughts on taking Brendan Sweeney out at any point in the ninth or tenth as his pitch count kept building?

“He’s our closer. I was going to stick with him. I thought the 2-1 pitch to Walk was a strike. And then, you know, instead of it being 2-2, it was 3-1. And instead of throwing a pitcher’s pitch, he had to make sure he didn’t walk him, because if you walk that kid, it’s a double. The kid hit a fly ball and just kept blowing. So, no, I had no feelings about taking him out until after the lead or the tie was broken. He’s our guy. I thought he threw the ball well and did a good job. He just didn’t get a lot of help, quite frankly.”

You mentioned not getting help. What do you see on those two ground balls in the ninth that got kicked? And then also, is there an update on Kennedy Jones?

“Well, Kennedy the pitch hit him in the fingers and bruised his fingers pretty bad. He couldn’t squeeze a bat after that or hold a bat, so I had to take him out of the game.

“Those guys have been making good plays for us all year. And if you want the ball hit to anybody, it would be especially to Carrion. He’s been so good. He just didn’t make that play. And it was a tough thing for the kid, because he’s playing his heart out and doing such a good job. I feel bad for him. But no one play loses a game for you. I know it’s coach cliche, but we should have won the game. I thought we outhit them. I thought we pitched great for the most part, and unfortunately, we just did a few things that ended up contributing to our demise in the game today.”

The groundball that Henry Kaczmar threw late over to first base. He looked at second base first. Should Jordan Carrion have been there? Or was he too far?

“I haven’t talked to Jordan about it. We weren’t playing in any kind of unusual defense. So I would have thought, if I was the shortstop, I would have tried to go to second as well. I don’t know why Jordan wasn’t able to get there. I’ll have to look at that. I don’t have a good answer for you. When the ball was hit, I just figured it was going to be a force out at second, and I guess he was late getting there. I don’t know. I couldn’t tell you, to be honest with you, without looking at a video of it.”

When the third baseman made the error in the 10th inning, was there any thought to bunting?

“There was one out, right? I wouldn’t have sacrifice bunted there. And as it turned out, we ended up getting runners in scoring position anyway, so we had a chance to win the game right there. I mean, if Evan thinks that he can bunt for a hit and beat the play out, he’s got the freedom to try to do that. But Evan’s been swinging the bat so well. Anyway, I was glad to see him swing. But we hit a couple of pop-ups to the right side there in the last inning. So that wasn’t good. It just didn’t happen for us.”

In the fourth, there was the Kennedy Jones single, and it looked like Ethan Petry was kind of stuck in between second and third. Is that the right play to watch that ball and make sure it gets down? Or was that on Monte Lee or Petry?

“Oh, no, no, no. I think, as I recall, I’m trying to remember, I think he just had to make sure that ball wasn’t caught, or he’d get doubled off. I don’t remember anything extraordinary about it. That was the play where the kid kind of decoyed him like he was going to make the catch, I think. I didn’t see any issues there. I think it was good base running. And he had to see that ball down. You don’t want to get double off on that. That was a missed opportunity for us.”

Just thoughts on Sunday pitching. It looked up pretty late in the game. Oklahoma had only got one hit. You’d probably take that, right?

“I was hoping to get five innings out of Dylan. Eskew’s not the most talented guy who doesn’t throw 98 miles an hour; sometimes, his command is off. He walked four and hit one again today. It’s just typically how he pitches, but he gets out of it. It’s amazing, really. The game starts with a walk and a hit batter, and I’m thinking, ‘Oh my goodness, we’re gonna get off to a bad start.’ Next thing you know, he’s running off, everybody’s running off the field. So he went four and a third innings and did what we needed him to do. We thought we had the bullpen set up the way we needed it to be, and it almost worked to perfection. Just in the seventh inning, we walked the first two batters, and they came around to score to tie the ball game. But then we got the lead back again. And I thought Sweeney was great in the eighth inning and got the leadoff hitter in the ninth inning. And then we couldn’t make a play for him after that.”

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