College of Charleston
USC Upstate
@CofCBaseball Handles USC Upstate
4/1/2015 2:21:00 AM | Baseball
SPARTANBURG, S.C. – College of Charleston baseball downed USC Upstate, 10-0, behind an all-around team effort in midweek action at Harley Field on Tuesday night.
Charleston (18-7) has won four straight and eight of its last nine games, as the Cougars prepare for their return to Colonial Athletic Association competition against Hofstra next weekend.
The Cougar bats achieved 16 hits for the third time in four games, with every Cougar in the lineup either picking up a hit or scoring a run. Four different pitchers took the mound, and limited the Spartans to five hits in the shutout.
Bradley Jones led the way offensively in a 3-for-5 outing with four RBIs and two runs scored, including a mammoth two-run homerun in the seventh inning. Erven Roper tallied three hits as well.
Nathan Helvey (3-3) earned the win in a predetermined split, limiting the Spartans to one hit without a walk in 4.0 scoreless innings. After a single in the first, Helvey forced a groundball for a 6-4-3 double play and retired every hitter he faced from then on, facing the minimum 12 hitters in 4.0 innings.
Will Detwiler, Luke Munson, and Carter Love combined in relief and preserved the shutout. Detwiler and Munson both worked around two hits in 2.0 innings apiece, with Detwiler forcing a double play to erase one of his runners, and Munson recording strikeouts for all six of his outs. Love pitched a three-up, three-down ninth inning to solidify the win.
“We really did a good job of setting the tone by scoring runs in the first four innings,” said head coach Monte Lee. “Nathan Helvey was outstanding; he only threw 38 pitches in four innings which is impressive. We got great relief outings out of all three guys, too. We swung the bats well; we played well defensively. Overall, it was just a really good ballgame for our club.”
The Cougars got on the board right away, with Ryan Brown singling up the middle and Blake Butler sending an RBI double to the wall in left center in the first inning.
In the second, Jones, Roper, and Champ Rowland strung consecutive singles together to score a run, and leave runners on the corners with one out. Brown hustled to break up a potential double play ball, allowing Roper to score and give the Cougars a 3-0 lead.
The Cougars put two more across in the third when a Butler single and a Nick Pappas double put two runners in scoring position, and Jones cleared the bases with a single down the left field line.
CofC plated another pair in the fourth with Brown and Alex Pastorius drawing walks to put runners on base for Carl Wise, who delivered both to the plate with a two-RBI single back up the middle.
Detwiler took the mound in the fifth and gave up a single, but forced a groundball for a 4-6-3 double play as Cougar pitchers faced the minimum 15 batters through 5.0 innings.
The lead remained 7-0 until the seventh, when Morgan Phillips boarded on a leadoff single and Jones sent a colossal shot out to straight-away center which cleared the batter's-eye screen beyond the homerun fence.
Munson entered the game to work the seventh, and found himself in a bases-loaded, no-out jam after a hit batsman, a single, and a walk, but bore down and rattled off three consecutive strikeouts to emerge unscathed.
The Cougars added another in the eighth when Wise led off with a single to right on a 2-2 pitch and worked his way around the bases before scoring on a two-out RBI single by Phillips.
Charleston returns to Patriots Point to host Hofstra in CAA play, with game one of a three game series scheduled for Friday, April 3 at 6 p.m.
“The biggest thing for us to worry about is game one,” said Lee. “Anytime you win game one, you put yourself in a good position to win the series. Our focus is on getting ready for Friday, and setting ourselves up to get another series.”
POSTGAME NOTES
The Cougars are now 10-1 when scoring in the first inning and 12-1 when scoring before their opponent. The Cougars are 15-0 when leading after the sixth inning.
The Cougars eclipsed double digits for the ninth time this season and third time in four games. CofC is 9-0 when scoring 10+.
Charleston entered the game ranked 19th in batting average and 28th in runs per game, and exceeded its per-game averages in both categories.
The Cougars have hit at least one home run in 12 of their last 15 games.
With two double plays, Cougar pitchers faced the minimum through five innings.
Blake Butler has at least one hit in 20 of the last 21 games and has reached base successfully* in 23 straight games. On the season, Butler has hits in 22 of CofC's 25 games.
Ryan Brown extended his hitting streak to five games and has reached successfully* in 11 straight games. As the Cougar leadoff, Brown has reached base successfully* in the first inning in four straight games and five of the last six.
Carl Wise has reached base* in 11 consecutive games as well.
*A reached-base streak includes base hits, walks, and hit by pitches. Reaching on an error or fielder's choice does not extend a reached-base streak.
