Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] On this episode of Cox Talking Gamecocks, Dawn Staley gets her 500th win. Baseball opens up with a series win, and men's basketball falls short again. Okay, here we go.
[00:00:55] Okay.
[00:00:56] Welcome to episode 376 of. Of Cox Talking Gamecocks. I am your host, Tim Cox, where I will keep every episode from 1801 to 2001. Hope you all had a lovely weekend out there, Gamecocks. And if you're lucky enough to have Monday off, you're still enjoying the weekend. If you're listening to this, I myself and part of that crew gonna, you know, have a relaxing Sunday. No Sunday scaries here, only to be putting them off 24 hours for the Monday. Scary. Some could argue just as bad. But nonetheless, it was certainly a very eventful weekend. Anywhere you looked, there was action. Gamecock Nation, professional college. You know, basketball outside of Gamecock Nation is roaring Olympics. It's just wall to wall action this weekend. And we're going to jump right into things here, starting with a weekend recap here. On Friday, softball was in action. They played a PA games, winning both of them. First one against Louisville nine to one. And then on in the afternoon, later in the afternoon, softball beat Boston University 6 to 2. And then Saturday, jam packed here. The equestrian team was in action, dominating UGA 16 3. That's. That's something we love to see, like, and I love that we get to play Georgia in football again, because that is a school that I really grew to hate. And so anytime where you see South Carolina beating Georgia, I absolutely love to see it as well. Softball had another pair of games on Saturday, beating Boston University again 6 to 1, and then also beating Kennesaw State 12 0. So a really nice weekend from the softball team.
[00:02:51] There was, of course, a little bit of a slow start there, but. But seems like the ladies have settled in. And to go 40 over a weekend and then you include, you know, a team like Louisville in there, that's certainly very impressive. Sometimes starts of seasons can be a little wonky, and it's great to see that team settle down. Women's tennis was also in action on Saturday. They beat Charlotte 4 nothing, and then also beat SC State 5 nothing. So that's a whole hell of a lot of wins. I mean, my goodness, it was a very good weekend from the majority of sports that were being played for South Carolina that, you know, this past weekend and all good things, things that we love to see. This is a really fun time of year where you got the basketball season in full swing and really Coming into that home stretch, Baseball and softballer getting off the ground. And then you got a couple other sports trickled in there, which just really brings it all together. It's kind of like in the fall when you have those couple of weeks of overlap with football, football and then basketball starting and it's just like, whoa, wall to wall action. But yeah, really, really good stuff there. But we do have to talk about baseball because that was the, you know, the, the big build up to this past weekend. Here it was opening weekend, you had a double header to start the season. Double header on Friday. So what a way to open up the year, right? Just right into it, back to back games.
[00:04:19] We love baseball in Columbia. So game one, first game of the season, Gamecocks beat Northern Kentucky 5 2. It was a little bit of a slow start to this game. Talk about starts of seasons and things like that. But it was a pair of home runs in the fifth inning that sparked the offense. And the boys took care of business from there.
[00:04:43] Riley Goodman, he got the start and a no decision. It was Josh Gunther who got the win in relief. He went a couple of innings in relief too, was pretty impressed to see that. And Alex Valentin got the save in game one. Patrick Evans went 1 for 3 with the first homer of the season and Dawson Harmon went 2 for 2 with two RBI. So it was a great start for the Yardcocks. Right? Game one, you gotta get off on the right foot here. There was all this trepidation and things like that going into this season. It felt great to see the guys get that first win there. And then it was game two of the doubleheader that got the blood pumping as the cardiac Yardcocks made an early season appearance. It would not be South Carolina Sports if there wasn't some drama when you least expected it, or some drama when maybe there didn't have to be.
[00:05:41] But that's why we do it, right? Northern Kentucky took an early lead in this one, but Carolina battled back, took the lead in the seventh thanks to a Tyler back.
[00:05:53] Tyler back single. Excuse me, but Carolina would give up the lead in the eighth. And then it was K.J. scobee with the heroics with a walk off home run in the ninth to give the Yardcocks a sweep of the doubleheader and start the season 2 0. So, like, what a way to start the year. A doubleheader is one thing. A crazy enough way to start a season. Then your second game, you're down late innings only to have a walk off win in the ninth. Like it had a little bit of everything. You got some drama, you had to come from behind. Oh my goodness gracious. Like it was exactly that. It was an early season Cardiac Yardcocks appearance. But you started two and a half, you sweep the double header. It's exactly how you wanted to do that. Tyler back went 3 for 5 and KJ Scoby went 3 for 4. AMP Phillips got the start and a no decision. Elijah Foster got the win in late relief. Just by the nature of how the game went there.
[00:06:57] Which brings us to game three, Saturday afternoon.
[00:07:02] And unfortunately the good feelings were rather short lived as the finale in this series came and went with South Carolina losing three to two.
[00:07:14] I, I'm not going to dive too much into the, into the box score on this one. I am going to dive in though onto what Paul Manieri said after this game here.
[00:07:24] Basically, I'm paraphrasing of course here he was saying that he felt the guys didn't have a lot of energy going into this game. He blamed the doubleheader, that guys were a little bit tired, whatever it may be. But then he said something and it's pretty much to the effect of, you know, I didn't have the guys ready to play, you know, and so we're saying you didn't have the guys ready to play. They're tired.
[00:07:54] It's game three.
[00:07:56] Like, what are we doing here? Like, like, like I put it out on social media and it's just the, like the good feelings lasted exactly two games, but one day and the season is already, were already reasons to be upset here. And I don't know the first thing about Northern Kentucky baseball. I'm not going to act like I do. They very well could be good. I have no idea. I'm going to assume that South Carolina should be better though.
[00:08:26] And yes, you see it all the time in college baseball where a team does not sweep their opener or you lose, you know, an early season game to a smaller school and the team is just fine. Like, yes, that is the nature of baseball, that it's a very finicky game. The margins are small, you know, you are going to lose games. This is not football. But my God, like we spent months questioning the leadership of this team and we finally had, you know, we got to the season. You're at the point where, all right, well, like, it is what it is. Let's see what we can do here.
[00:09:09] And in game three, you drop this game and the head coach is saying he didn't have the guys ready to play. How Is that possible?
[00:09:19] Like, it just makes no sense to me. And I was so excited to see the guys get underway. And you know, I talked about it before, like, I was excited for the season, hopeful was a different level, but, man, like, that blows to, you know, drop that game. You know, you're two and one now. Like, this team needs early season momentum. You have a bunch of new faces that, yes, over the course of the season, they absolutely could gel together and they absolutely could, you know, learn how to battle through some of this adversity and things like that. But to me, like, this team needs confidence. Like all the holdovers from last year need confidence. They need to see these wins. The fans need to see early season wins. We're going to need fan support come SEC time.
[00:10:12] You know, you need to have home field advantage means something at Founders, and losing the third game of the year to Northern Kentucky is not exactly going to do that.
[00:10:22] So a very interesting start to a Gamecock baseball season, which was already teetering. I feel like on starting off on a good foot or not. But nonetheless, you do get the win. You know, you get the series win. That's the goal, right? You. You want to win series.
[00:10:41] You know, what did Ray Tanner say the old adage was, win your series at home and just don't get swept on the road. Well, the guys accomplished the first part of that statement, and so we'll see how it goes. Looking ahead, the guys have a couple of midweek games Tuesday evening taking on Wofford, and then Wednesday afternoon taking on Gardner Webb also. So a chance to quickly bounce back.
[00:11:07] Right. I know we're still in the very early stages of this thing, but if you can take both of those and you're sitting at what would then be 4 and 1, like that's. That's fine. Like, that's. That's palatable. And also, of course, the manner in which we're doing these things, right, like, this team was built to try and have some more power.
[00:11:28] You saw that on display in the first two games.
[00:11:32] So if you are able to put some more offense together. And you know, they always say pitching beats hitting early in the year. So give it a few games for the bats to warm up and let's see what they can do and battle through some of this early test.
[00:11:49] And then also this weekend, we had plenty of basketball going on here. So starting with men's basketball here, Saturday evening, the guys were in action at Alabama. And. And stop me if you've heard this one before, but a late Gamecock rally comes up short.
[00:12:08] Yep, because that's exactly what happened against Alabama as the GameCocks dropped another one, 89 to 75. It was a 13 point deficit at the half. South Carolina had a very solid second half. It was neck and neck with Alabama, but ultimately it was just too much to overcome. I think the guys brought it within off the top of my head, we're trying to remember here, I think it was like eight points or so, nine points. But then pretty quickly Alabama was able to bounce back and extend that to double digits and did not look back for a good chunk of the second half here. So feeling like a broken record on this one where, you know, just don't have the ability to complete that late rally and get over the hump there. Mei Johnson had 26 points, a really strong game for him. Kobe Knox with 21, I think that was a career high. And Mike had 14. Everybody else in rather low single digits. So not exactly the complete effort that you'd hope for. And again, it's exactly that. Like I feel like a broken record. We're sitting here yet again, you know, with a headline that says a late rally came up short or you know, they, you know, Gamecocks played well at times, but not well enough and you got one or two really good efforts and the rest of the team not so much. And it's just tough, right? It's just exactly, it's exactly that. And I kind of had a loss at this point. You know, I've, I've made my statement, I've made my case that I do think this team needs some new leadership and really until proven otherwise, that's what we're just going to keep doubling and tripling down on. So tough one for Carolina. That's a tough road game.
[00:13:56] That's a pretty good, well coached team in Alabama and so you come up shy in that one. Next game for Carolina does not get any easier. They are on the road Tuesday evening at Florida. Florida really put the hurt on us earlier in the year.
[00:14:10] That was really the, I mean I know we've, we saw some tough games against Power 4 teams and SEC, but the team showed fight like that was. The Florida game was one where they really put a hurt on us and I really, I think signaled that this season was going sideways in a hurry. So hopefully the guys can bring some better effort. That's what we're hoping for at this one. Just bring a good effort.
[00:14:37] Maybe some things click and maybe Florida has an off night at home and you take it from there.
[00:14:45] Yeah.
[00:14:46] But on the Exact polar opposite side of that is the women's team, who was also in action at the exact same time Saturday evening. I called it Appointment TV last episode, and that did not disappoint as the ladies took on LSU and got the D.
[00:15:06] These teams have had some battles over the last few years, and this was another one to add on to that list, as Dawn Staley, the Queen, got her 500th win, getting it on the road in the bayou again, winning 79 to 72. And this one also got your blood pumping. I mean, my goodness, it came down to the wire.
[00:15:31] Tessa Johnson and Raven Johnson played incredibly well, especially in the second half. The Gamecocks got some strong post play late from Medina as well. And it was really the Gamecock's ability to take advantage of any opportunity LSU gave them in that second half, which is exactly the championship pedigree that Dawn Staley brings.
[00:15:59] And I think what you saw on display was the veterans on this team knowing how to handle themselves in these types of games. When things got tight late, you know, you saw LSU making mistakes left and right, you know, uncharacteristic by some of their players or just, you know, not being able to hit clutch free throws or clutch layups, things like that. And Carolina was able to take advantage of. Of that late. And I talked a lot about going into this game how these programs, in my mind, are pretty opposite. Like, they both have won at a very high level, but just the way that they go about their business. And it's really just different styles of coaching. Not necessarily to say one is objectively right and the other one objectively wrong, but I think it's pretty clear that Don Staley is a very different coach than Kim Mulkey.
[00:16:56] And anytime I watch lsu, you just see the emotion on LSU sidelines.
[00:17:02] Big highs, big lows. And I think when you do that, you can get yourself into some trouble when things start to tighten up late and you have to dig deep and calm yourself, right? And dawn, while she can get animated on the sidelines, I think, tries to instill a sense of calm and steadiness among her team. And I think that definitely helps, because you are on the road in a tough environment, and they're coming for you, and you're trying to fend off a late lead, and, you know, they close the gap, but you're able to just stay steady, do your job, get a couple of big buckets late, take advantage of a couple of misses, and you end up with a very, very impressive win. And it's exactly the word that I came back to. I'm just impressed with this team after this one. You know, this year hasn't come easy necessarily for this squad. You know, they still have an incredibly impressive record sitting atop the sec, but it just hasn't been, it hasn't always come easy for the ladies as it has maybe in years past. So this group stuck this one out, held it together and got a huge, huge win.
[00:18:19] Player highlights here, Tessa Johnson 21 points, Raven Johnson 19, Medina with 12. Next game for the ladies will be Thursday night at Alabama as they look to continue rolling here.
[00:18:32] But with that, y', all, that wraps up this episode. Please follow me on social media, Twitter or X is Cox a gamecox and Instagram is just the name of the show. Cox Talking Gamecocks. And please, like subscribe and review the podcast. I appreciate all y'. All. Go Cox.
