South Carolina sweeps doubleheader, takes series over No. 1 Texas

A week ago, this Gamecock team was reeling after being swept by their rival. Seven days later, it’s celebrating on its own field fresh off knocking off the top-ranked team in the nation.

South Carolina upset No. 1 Texas at Founders Park, sweeping a doubleheader Sunday. The Gamecocks outscored the Longhorns 13-6 and dominated for the majority of the 16 innings played to notch a big early-season series victory.

“Obviously a great, great day for us. It’s exactly what we needed, what our fans needed, what our players and coaches (needed),” Mark Kingston said. “It’s one of the best days for Gamecock baseball since I’ve been here. Beating the number one team in the country twice in one day is almost impossible. For our guys to do that in the manner we did it was very important.”

It’s South Carolina’s first series win over a No. 1 team since 2011.

South Carolina’s pitching staff—decimated with injuries over the first two weeks of the year—was dominant Sunday. It started with Will Sanders and ended with true freshman Matthew Becker’s coming out party in game two.

Sanders motored through six innings of two-run baseball. He pitched out of a few jams to the tune of six strikeouts, earning his third win in four starts.

Matthew Becker headlined the day, though, serving up an electric outing in his first career start. His only hit allowed in six innings—a solo home run—came in the first inning. He didn’t allow one in five straight innings to end his outing, piling up a career-high 11 strikeouts to just three walks.

“He was the best available at that point,” Kingston said. “I didn’t expect one hit in six innings and 11 strikeouts but when you give guys opportunities sometimes they run with it. He did today. Three really good pitches for strikes. He dominated.”

The freshman sliced his way through the top-ranked team in the country to give the Gamecocks (9-6) the series win. He showed some high-level emotion, sheathing a sword to celebrate an inning-ending strikeout then fist-pumping off the mound on another.

“It’s always fun,” Becker said. “Coach (Justin) Parker tells us to pitch with emotion but not emotional. Throwing like that gets everyone fired up and guess gets me more locked in.”

Offensively, the Gamecocks did just enough in game one to even the series—a 4-2 win—but put on a clinic in game two.

After four runs in the seven-inning game with a RBI fielder’s choice, two sacrifice flies and also an RBI single in the first game Sunday the Gamecocks put up nine runs on 14 hits in game two.

They’d tie the game in the third with a Kevin Madden single before taking the lead for good in the fourth. South Carolina sent 10 to the plate as part of a five-running inning. They’d put up three more in the sixth, essentially putting the game out of reach.

“That’s great. We needed that. Obviously, that goes to show what our offense can do,” said Braylen Wimmer, who went a combined 4-for-8 Sunday with a pair of RBI. “That’s one of the best pitching staffs in the country. If we go out there and do that every weekend we’ll be in good shape.”

Against a staff entering the weekend with an ERA below two, the Gamecocks also put up 20 hits total Sunday, only one for extra bases. South Carolina walked 10 total times to 14 strikeouts and had five singles to plate runs.

South Carolina also hit 7-for-15 with runners in scoring position in game two.

“They’ve been the best pitching staff in the country and we just took great at-bats. I don’t know if we needed to be more locked in. it’s hard to put your finger on why we struggled to score last weekend,” Kingston said.

“I think you have to tip your cap to the team we played last week. Their pitching is really good. So is Texas and maybe what we went through last week helped us be ready for what we saw this weekend.”

Texas tried to make things interesting late, plating three runs in the ninth of game two, but Parker Coyne settled things down and closed out the game to seal a 9-4 win.

South Carolina begins SEC play next weekend against a top 15 Tennessee team, but they do it after a marquee series win.

“That’s for fans and media to talk about statements,” Kingston said. “We’re just here to play baseball and win games. We did that today. I’m not sure many prognosticators predicted that today. We don’t care.”

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