CLEMSON, S.C. – No. 7 national seed Clemson hit seven home runs and took advantage of 17 bases on balls to down Western Carolina, 24-10, Friday at the NCAA Clemson Regional at a sold-out Doug Kingsmore Stadium. A grand slam from Atlantic Coast Conference Player of the Year Seth Beer highlighted a 10-run third inning as the Tigers scored 18 straight runs after trailing early.
The Tigers (43-18) advance to face Oklahoma State in a winners’ bracket game Saturday at 7 p.m. Western Carolina (30-30) will take on Nebraska in an elimination game Saturday at noon.
After the Catamounts built a 6-0 lead through three innings, Clemson swung momentum with its 10-run outburst in the bottom of the third. With five runs already in and the bases loaded, Beer greeted reliever Colton Davis – the third WCU pitcher of the inning – with his 17th home run of the year, high off the batter’s eye in center field. Chris Okey followed with a homer of his own to left to make it an even 10 runs scored in the frame, seven of them coming with two outs.
The Clemson rally spoiled a promising start for the SoCon champion Catamounts. Caleb Robinson got Western Carolina on the board with a two-out, two-run home run in the top of the second, lifting a 3-2 pitch out to left, just out of the reach of leaping left fielder Reed Rohlman.
Western Carolina piled on with a four-run third, aided by two Clemson errors, a hit batter and a wild pitch. After the first two batters reached via errors, Brett Pope singled to center to score J.D. Long. Bryson Bowman followed with a bloop single to right to score Garrett Brown, and a Matt Smith fielder’s choice scored Pope. A single and a hit batter loaded the bases, but after Clemson starter Charlie Barnes got a shallow fly to center for the second out, he uncorked a wild pitch to score Smith with the fourth run of the inning before getting a groundout to stop the bleeding.
Down 10-6 in the fifth, Western Carolina had a chance to cut into the deficit but failed to score after loading the bases with no one out. Smith led off the inning with a bunt single that died down the third-base line, Danny Bermudez drew a walk and Kramer Ferrell reached on a fielder’s choice and error as the Catamounts seemed to be in business. Barnes worked out of trouble, however, getting a strikeout and a 4-6-3 double play to get out of the inning unscathed.
The Tigers continued to put up crooked numbers, plating five more runs in the fifth, highlighted by Williams’ three-run homer. Okey hit his second home run of the game, a three-run shot, in the sixth, and Mike Triller and Eli White hit homers in the seventh to offset a three-run top half by WCU that saw Robinson notch a two-run single and Nobu Suzuki produce an RBI groundout.
A Smith sacrifice fly in the top of the eighth accounted for Western Carolina’s final run of the contest, but the Tigers added three more in the eighth, including Triller’s second two-run blast of the game, for the final margin.
All told, seven Western Carolina pitchers combined to throw 258 pitches on the evening. The Tigers had more walks than hits (14) in the contest.
Four players had at least four RBIs for Clemson, as Williams had five and Beer, Okey and Triller had four each. Okey was 3-for-3 and drew three walks to reach base six times, scoring four times.
Pope led Western Carolina at the plate with four hits in five at-bats, while Robinson had two hits and four RBIs.
Korey Anderson (1-4) took the loss after surrendering four runs on one hit and two walks in 1/3 of an innings.
Barnes improved to 6-4, allowing nine runs (five earned) on eight hits and three walks in 6 1/3 innings. He struck out six.
-www.SoConSports.com-