It was a warm and beautiful day at Founders Park for Opening Day, but the Gamecock bats went cold as the game went on and VMI got the 7-6 win.
"The key there was we struck out too many times with runners in scoring position," head coach Mark Kingston said. "I thought guys got really excited with the big home run in the first inning and then started over swinging."
It looked like the Gamecocks came onto the field energized and ready to play. Down by one with two outs in the bottom of the first, Carlos Cortes started the rally. He doubled into right field, starting a string of four two-out hits. The streak featured two doubles and a Jacob Olson home run to give South Carolina an early 4-1 lead.
Junior Adam Hill threw his first Friday night game and didn't have the best night. Hill lasted four innings, giving up seven earned runs on five hits with three walks and six strikeouts. A busy second wore him out, as he was already at 46 pitches through the first two innings.
Hill had a clean third inning and the Gamecocks had the lead in the fourth, but an inning-ending double play was overturned after Hill had already walked off the field, bringing everyone back on. That ended up leading to back-to-back home runs that gave VMI the lead for the rest of the game. Although Hill struggled, Kingston still believes in his guy.
"He needs to be better," Kingston said of Hill's performance. "Obviously he needs to be better. Seven earned runs on a Friday night doesn't cut it for anybody. He knows that, he'll work hard at it with Coach Meade this week and he'll get it squared away. He'll be much better next week."
The Gamecocks did have a few bright spots in the loss, as they scored six runs on 11 hits. Madison Stokes had two RBI doubles, Jacob Olson had a home run in the first and many players were hitting balls far to the track that just missed going out. But the Gamecocks know that there's still room for improvement, like plate approach with two strikes and hitting with runners in scoring position. South Carolina left 15 runners on base in the loss.
"We put up a bunch of runs, had what 10, 11 hits, so that was a positive for sure," Stokes said. "We obviously have some things that we can point out that we need to work on, with two strikes maybe, but we did, for sure, have positives. We didn't come out with the win but we can take away some positives from the game."
Despite the loss, this game meant a lot to Olson. His cousin Brody passed away a little over a month ago, and Olson has said he wants to play in honor of him. After hitting that home run in the first, Olson signaled to the sky in honor of Brody.
"It's really hard to put that into words how I was feeling, it was such a, a feeling that I'll probably never, never top that. That was unbelievable," Olson said. "I know Brody was looking down on me, smiling ... it was definitely a huge moment for me."
Kingston also got what he needed out of freshman pitcher John Gilreath, who had already impressed him during the spring. Gilreath gave up his last high school season to join the Gamecocks and has made an early mark on the team. He relieved Hill and pitched four scoreless innings, while striking out four and not allowing a walk.
"I thought for a kid that's supposed to be a high school senior he showed everybody why he came early," Kingston said of Gilreath. "He wasn't afraid of the situation, he was in front of a huge, great crowd out there tonight and threw four innings scoreless with no walks. That's what we're asking our pitchers to do."
The Gamecocks won't have long to sit on the loss, as game two against VMI is Saturday at noon.