Sloppy start puts South Carolina behind early in game two loss on Saturday

The Force can sometimes work in mysterious ways. And on Star Wars Day, of course, that’s exactly what happened in Columbia, Missouri on Saturday.

After throwing just 20 pitches, Missouri left-hander Javyn Pimental exited with an apparent injury. With runners on the corners and one out in the first inning, it seemed like South Carolina was about to pick up where it left off from on Friday.

But after a brief delay in the action, the Tigers called on Carter Roustad to warm up as quick as possible then work out of a big jam. And he did just that. After walking the bases loaded, Roustad got the final two outs to put up a big zero on the scoreboard.

It would become one of those days for the Gamecocks (31-15, 12-11 SEC) where nothing seemed to go right. They fell behind early and could never quite recover in an 8-3 loss to the Tigers in the middle game of the series.

“It’s a challenge, but we should be able to overcome that challenge. That was their best guy on the mound they had going,” head coach Mark Kingston told GamecockCentral. “We had a good game plan against (Pimental). Unfortunately, he got injured. Hope he’s okay. They brought in a guy behind him that was the exact opposite, and we didn’t make good adjustments against him.”

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Right out of the gate, Missouri was all over Eli Jones, who didn’t have his best stuff for the second straight outing. He only lasted 2.2 innings and gave up five runs on seven hits. He struck out two and walked three on 57 pitches.

“His stuff just hasn’t been as good lately, and we’ve got to figure out why. We’ve got to figure out how to get his stuff back to what it was earlier in the year,” Kingston said. “He just hasn’t been as sharp lately, the stuff hasn’t been what it was. So we’ve got to figure out the reason. Nobody works harder than Eli. Nobody wants it more than him. So we’ve just got to find a way to help him.”

While the final line indicated Jones didn’t have a good start, his defense didn’t do him many favors in helping him out. When Missouri broke out for four runs in the first, one of them came off a bobbled ball in left field by Kennedy Jones.

Later in the frame with two outs, a routine ground ball was hit to second base. The only problem was that Ethan Petry couldn’t get over to the first base bag in time, allowing two runs to score.

“It didn’t help for sure,” Kingston said on the defensive struggles. “(Jones) could’ve gotten out of that first inning with just two runs on that ground ball to the right side. Look, if you put guys in new positions, every now and then that might rear its ugly head. It did today. So we’ll learn from it and be better tomorrow.”

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Things weren’t much better on the offensive side for South Carolina. After the Tigers had to go to their bullpen rather early, Roustad settled in nicely and tossed 6.2 strong innings.

For the most part, everything was working well for the right-hander. He got tagged for two runs in the sixth as Cole Messina and Gavin Casas each picked up RBI hits. In the seventh, Blake Jackson got to him and hit a solo homer with two outs.

Outside of that, Roustad did more than good enough after coming into an unforeseen situation. He gave up three runs on five hits and struck out six without a walk.

“We’ve been doing a great job lately of swinging at the right pitches and taking the pitches that can’t be hit hard,” Kingston said. “And today, we didn’t do that as well as we’ve been doing it. He used that to his advantage. He kept the fastball up in the zone and he kept his off speed pitches down. We just weren’t sharp today.”

After Matthew Becker was tagged for two runs in 1.1 innings of work after Jones, the bullpen did a nice job of limiting any further damage. Tyler Pitzer pitched 2.1 innings of one-run ball, striking out five and walking two. Parker Marlatt, who pitched on Friday, came in after and didn’t allow a hit over 1.2 innings.

Up next: South Carolina will go for the series win in game three on Sunday. First pitch is at 2 p.m. on SEC Network Plus. The Gamecocks have yet to announce a starting pitcher.

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