Casas, McGillis home runs power South Carolina past Penn in dramatic finish

South Carolina spent the offseason bringing in a wealth of transfers offensively, hoping most will make an impact at the plate and lead to a few more wins. 

Sunday the Gamecocks got their wish. 

With South Carolina trailing by a run in the eighth inning, newcomers Gavin Casas and Will McGillis decided to change that. The transfers went back-to-back to leadoff the eighth inning in dramatic fashion, clinching a 6-5 win over Penn and the series sweep. 

“They’ve been a nice addition to the lineup. We kind of followed that Texas A&M model,” Mark Kingston said. “We knew with the pitching we had, we wanted an offense that could grind you down and take veteran at-bats. By far it’s not the best offensive day for us. But you look at the season as a whole those guys have really helped.” 

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The offense, which had left, as Kingston said, “a small village” of runners on over the first seven innings, finally got a few big hits late and did it with a flourish. 

Casas rocked a 2-2 pitch over the wall in right field, a no-doubter. Casas punctuated it admiring the bomb and flipping his bat toward the South Carolina dugout. 

“It’s not just about schmoozing in those situations. You can’t just talk about it. Gavin came up in the eighth inning and actually did it,” McGillis said. “That was really nice to see. Sometimes it can get boring when guys are saying, ‘Now we go! Now we go!’ Someone’s got to do it. Gavin did it today.” 

He couldn’t admire it too long because McGillis hit a solo shot two pitches later, hooking one around the foul pole in left to give the Gamecocks (8-0) their first lead since the fifth inning. 

“The first pitch I decided to take it cause the place was going crazy. I didn’t want to get too big and try to hit a homer,” McGillis said. “The next pitch he threw a slider. I hit it and thought it was actually going to go farther.” 

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It saved an offense that struggled to get a big hit with runners on base for large portions of the game. The Gamecocks stranded runners in every inning before the eighth, including multiple runners six of those. 

They stranded the bases loaded three times in the first six innings. They ultimately stranded 19 Sunday and stranded 14 with runners in scoring position. 

“There was no panic in the dugout. We had the resolve to keep going and we were not going to give up until the game was over and we found a way,” Kingston said. “We found a way to win. The only stat on this whole sheet that matters is who won and who lost. And we found a way to win.”

Click for Sunday’s box score.

Penn used that scuffling offense to its advantage. The Quakers waiting out starter Jack Mahoney and jumping on him in the fifth inning. 

After motoring through four innings of one-hit, shutout baseball, the right-hander hit trouble. Mahoney gave up a run on three straight singles to open the inning, pitching out of the jam after that. 

He wouldn’t get as lucky in the sixth. Mahoney loaded the bases with nobody out, giving up a full-count walk to end his day. Of his 90 pitches Sunday, 44 came over his final 1.1 innings of work. 

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All of those inherited runners would come around to score in the sixth as Penn took the lead off Eli Jerzembeck. The Gamecocks’ freshman pitcher, in his second career outing and first out of the bullpen, would give up a game-tying walk followed by an RBI single and fielder’s choice. 

“He’s one of our better guys. In a big situation, we wanted to get his feet wet and see how he responded in that situation. It was a tough situation, but early in the season is when you try to find these things out,” Kingston said. “He wanted a situation like that. We wanted to see him in a situation like that. The more these guys are in situations like that the more comfortable they’ll be next time.”  

Mahoney finished allowing four runs, all earned, over 5.1 innings while allowing five hits and a pair of walks. 

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South Carolina did fight back to tie the game with a home run from Braylen Wimmer and RBI groundout from Cole Messina, but Penn would re-take the lead thanks to a solo shot of its own.

Eli Jerzembeck would allow one run, a solo shot in the eighth, over 2.1 innings but Chris Veach came in and slammed the door in the ninth to pick up his second save of the weekend. 

“When your team has been fighting their butts off for the last three hours and you’re the guy who has to get the last three outs,” Kingston said, “and the crowd is relying on you to get the last three outs, it takes a little something different. He definitely has that it factor. He’s so happy to be here and be a Gamecock. He has the stuff, he has the command and the heart to get it done.”

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Up next: South Carolina’s final game of a nine-game homestand to start the season starts on Tuesday. The Gamecocks host NC A&T at 4 p.m. with the game on SEC Network Plus. No starter has been named yet.