Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] On this episode of Cox Talking Gamecock, softball hosts a regional. Men's tennis season is over and baseball woes continue.
[00:00:09] Okay, here we go.
[00:00:54] Okay.
[00:00:56] Welcome to episode, episode 320 of Cox Talking Gamecocks. I am your host, Tim Cox, where I will keep every episode from 1801 to 2001 and talk about a mixed bag of a weekend. I mean, gonna get into it in a second here, but shoot, we. We have been through the ringer lately as Gamecock fans. I mean, seriously, like, sitting here on another bleak Monday. Feels like the entire southeast is covered in rain and just throwing our hands up in confusement and bewilderment into one of our programs. But then at the same time, we're celebrating another doing something pretty remarkable again. I'm gonna get into that in a second. But yeah, just sitting here after the weekend just like, dang, like the roller coaster that is Gamecock athletics just continues. It really, really does. But nonetheless. Hope y' all had a good weekend. Hope you were able to get out and do some stuff before the rain hit. It was just crazy. I was down in the low country this weekend and yeah, it was rainy.
[00:02:12] My goodness. This is not a rain or a weather podcast, rather.
[00:02:17] But yeah, hope y' all had a great weekend and are ready to attack this week. Let's make it a good one, huh? Make it a good one. Productive work towards something.
[00:02:27] I don't know, trying to feel inspired this morning after the baseball team just absolutely destroying souls. But nonetheless, here, let's jump into things here, starting with my Gamecock calendar here.
[00:02:43] Today is actually not a piece of trivia. It is a fact.
[00:02:47] So Emily White was considered the first lady of the University of South Carolina Athletics because she had served as an administrative assistant for the department from 1967 through her retirement in 2012.
[00:03:06] She continued to work part time in the executive offices of USC Athletics and even after formally retiring. Shout out Emily White.
[00:03:16] Wow. Shout out her family.
[00:03:18] That's incredible. Like, that is just. I don't care who you're working for. That is dedication. And that's the love for what you do. That's inspiring. How about that for a Monday?
[00:03:29] Find something to love like Emily White. Loved the administrative assistant role at USC athletics.
[00:03:37] Shout out the first lady of USC Athletics.
[00:03:41] If you guys haven't speaking of loving Gamecocks, like, throughout your entire life, I'm sure you have seen it.
[00:03:48] Go watch what Shane Beamer did for a lifelong hundred year old fan.
[00:03:57] And oh my God, so cool. The football team posted the video.
[00:04:00] Beamer. I won't spoil it. I mean, I can't because you're gonna listen to my voice and you're not gonna cry. But you might watch that video and you might cry. But basically there was this 100 year old woman who was just turning 100 and lifelong Gamecock fan. The family got in touch with the team, just wanted to get an autograph from Beamer. And Beamer, being the nice guy that he is, like a genuine nice human, like went out of his way and hand delivered a sign ball for her and met her family. And my gosh, just to hear her excitement at that age still to meet him and to see old pictures of her working outside of Willie B. And doing things like that, just that's what it's all about. That's what college athletics are all about. I think we sometimes can get caught up in the wins and losses and like sort of that short term gratification or not, but it brings people together. Sports in general is meant to bring people together. It's supposed to bring some sort of fun. If nothing else, it does evoke emotion in us. But nonetheless, yeah, really, really cool thing that Beamer did there. Go check it out. I mean, that's forever to thee, you know, for real. It is as a forever thing here, for better or worse.
[00:05:20] All right, let's do a weekend recap here before I jump into some more detailed coverage here. There really was not a lot of action on over the weekend except itself. Baseball had a double header on Friday, Saturday and Sunday was really open for the most part. But Friday, men's tennis unfortunately lost to Stanford 4 nothing. They tried to have a big comeback. Unfortunately it came up short and this ended their season. So strong season from the team this year, making it decently far into the postseason. Show shout out to men's tennis. Unfortunately, it has come to an end. But yeah, good season from the guys there. And then speaking of a good season, we're talking about softball here.
[00:06:08] On Thursday, the ladies did lose to Texas A and M, thus ending their run in the SEC tournament. They beat Alabama in the first game to move on to that. A and M having a very, very good year. They are a very, very good team. So really no shame in coming up short to them. But when that ended, the whole, you know, you had to wait for the tournament to end and then it was a waiting game on Sunday to find out who was going where for regionals.
[00:06:42] And when Coach Chastain was speaking to the media after the A and M game, she was, you know, pitching her case for our team to host a regional and talking about all that we've done and not shying away from good competition in the non conference schedule. Having a really strong record in the sec and you know, maybe despite a somewhat early exit in the conference tournament, losing to a really good team like A and M really shouldn't be a blemish on the resume.
[00:07:15] So Sunday evening comes around, everybody is waiting with bated breath, and the Gamecocks have received a top eight national seed, meaning we will host a regional.
[00:07:28] Postseason action is in Columbia. That is electric. This is the first time that this has happened in the modern era of, of the program. So just an incredible result for the ladies.
[00:07:44] They have had a really, really good season this year. They are a very good team. They've had a very strong record in the sec.
[00:07:53] They've performed well against good non conference competition and they are handsomely rewarded with this. And I think there's the top eight means you will host a supers if things fall the right way. So we don't want to get ahead of ourself, but there is a path that goes to the College World Series of Softball that goes through Columbia.
[00:08:20] And then when you look at also like where the other teams that have given Carolina fits fell, it doesn't really work out that South Carolina is going to have to go against, you know, like an LSU or something like that. Right. So a very good draw for this team. Shout out this entire team. You know, we've been following them along and I think Gamecock Nation slowly but surely like was turning more and more attention to this team. And it's been really cool to see the support that they have gotten from our fan base and rightfully so.
[00:08:56] Like just again, just a fantastic reward for a great season that is still continuing, you know. So again, you're hosting a regional in Columbia. That regional will include of course, South Carolina, Virginia, North Florida, which I feel like we just talked about this. Like all of a sudden North Florida is playing South Carolina in seemingly everything. I don't know what the hell's going on. It's like that.
[00:09:27] What's it called with the relationship when you have a little fish that swims next to the shark?
[00:09:34] Like a symbiotic relationship. I don't know, something like that. That feels like North Florida all of a sudden just playing us in basketball, baseball. Now they're in our regional.
[00:09:45] I don't know.
[00:09:46] And then the last team in the regional is Elon. So it's Carolina, Virginia, North Florida and Elon. The regional will take place May 16th through the 18th and we'll see how it goes. I mean I'm not going to sit here and say I know a lot about Virginia, North Florida and Elon softball because I don't. But I don't think any one of them are a particular huge powerhouse. So if you're looking at this at complete face value, I like Carolina's chances in this one. Just going to have to continue to do what we do. We have solid pitching, we have good timely hitting and you know, I think a calling card of this team since the coaching change has been incredibly strong defense.
[00:10:34] So continue to play that our game.
[00:10:37] And if you can get through a regional, anything can happen, especially if it works out where you're hosting that supers. But Columbia is going to be rocking. You know, going to talk about baseball in a second here, but the people Gamecock nation want postseason action in Colombia. We've always taken pride on hosting regionals on the other side of town. Right. And founders. But now that we have that opportunity for softball in a very nice stadium, we're going to take a lot of pride in that. We're going to take it seriously. And I think the fans are going to show up to tenfold for this and it's just a lot of excitement. So really, really big Shout out to the softball team next episode. We'll talk about results, talk about the bracket, how everything's looking. But yeah, post season action is in fact in Columbia. Shout out to the softball team and then moving on to the other side of the spectrum.
[00:11:37] This is your. This is your jump scare warning. If you're listening to this talking baseball here.
[00:11:43] The team was on the road this past weekend and frankly it was yet another series to forget here. The Gamecocks were swept by Auburn in pretty tough fashion all the way around.
[00:12:01] The Thursday was the opener. So this game got started their season series. Excuse me. Got started. Can't speak. The series got started. You know, wasn't. It was a Thursday to Saturday, but then Friday ended up being a double header here. So Thursday South Carolina lost in the opener 24 to 2.
[00:12:22] Yes, you heard that right.
[00:12:25] And the craziest part is that not long ago we were coming off a similar score where you almost have to rub your eyes and remind yourself that this was not basketball or football, this was baseball. And you lost 24 to 2.
[00:12:41] There's just nothing else you can say about it. There's just not.
[00:12:45] So game two was the first of a doubleheader on Friday. This one was hard fought for Carolina. You got to give the boys credit came in after a frankly embarrassing loss. And you came in Friday and you fought and unfortunately you come up just shy, losing in tough fashion, 11 to 10. Carolina was down early, but they hung in there and the boys put up three runs in the fourth and the sixth after Auburn took the lead in the bottom of the six. Carolina battled and got back on top, scoring eight, scoring in the eighth, and then got some insurance in the ninth. But Auburn walked it off to win by one and it's just again losing in a tough, tough fashion, not being able to put a team away, letting them hang around.
[00:13:34] Jake McCoy got the start and a no decision in that one. Ashton Crowther got the loss in relief. Player highlights There were some really great efforts in this game. Again, KJ Scoby 3 for 4 with 4 RBI. Henry Kazmar 3 for 5 with 2 Ribby's. The series finale was later on in Friday and it was more in line with the opening game.
[00:13:59] Not too, not as lopsided, but still pretty bad. Carolina falling 11 to 3.
[00:14:07] Dylan Eskew got the start and loss.
[00:14:11] And really after Thursday, there were a lot of questions being thrown out there just amongst our fan base, social media, around the dinner table, at the bar. Doesn't matter.
[00:14:27] And you know, Friday, that first game, the guy showed some life. But I think a lot of these questions remain after we're sitting here after the sweep and it's just what has happened to South Carolina baseball?
[00:14:42] I mean, really?
[00:14:44] And, you know, questions like, is this rock bottom for the program?
[00:14:48] And it just, it just sucks. Like, I, I've sat here and I've talked with y' all week after week, talking about how bad this has gotten and how sideways this has gotten.
[00:15:01] And it's just so strange because, you know, the season started okay. It's just the second we got into SEC play. And I mean, you know, looking at the rivalry game with the team of the Upstate, looking how things went against Uncle.
[00:15:17] You know, it's not just the sec, it's power four competition this team has struggled with.
[00:15:25] And you know, I sit here today and again, opinions can change, right? But I sit here today with the regular season almost over, having shared a lot of thoughts about where this program has gone this year, the hiring of Monary, all this Jazz. And I sit here today after being swept yet again, and I do think this is about as bad as it can get.
[00:15:56] It is. And it's bad as it can get because of where we know the program can be.
[00:16:04] You know, it's not like we're always bad.
[00:16:08] You. You know, like, we. We fired a coach in Kingston because, A, that the relationship had gotten stale, but B, because he wasn't doing enough in the postseason.
[00:16:21] You know, like, we had such high standards for the program that just getting to regionals wasn't enough. Like, yes, he did miss some.
[00:16:32] You know, I talked last year about getting to regionals is the minimum for a place like South Carolina.
[00:16:43] So, like, that's the expectations and that's the passion and that's the love that we have for this program.
[00:16:50] Like, yes, we have the national championships to look back on. We have those Omaha runs to look back on.
[00:16:58] It had been a little bit since we won a College World Series, for sure. It had been a little bit since we got into Omaha, but it's still even just beyond those two, like, leading up to those and everything, there was a standard that had set at South Carolina.
[00:17:17] And we have slowly seen this go a little bit down, a little bit down, a little bit down, like changing our expectations a little bit by little bit by little bit. Meanwhile, other programs were either maintaining strong performance, like an lsu, like a Florida, or some other teams were just excelling. And then you add the teams like Texas to the sec, and all of a sudden, when you were maybe hanging around in the top half, now you're certainly middle to bottom half, and now it's fallen off a cliff and there's a lot of blame to be thrown around. Minary's the head guy, so he catches all the blame.
[00:17:59] The assistant coaches on this team have just not really done much like the pitching coach has.
[00:18:07] You know, you're losing 24 to 2, 11 to 3. There is not communication. There is not development, you know, and it's just not.
[00:18:20] It's not working. And, you know, when you talk about rock bottom for a program, like, I don't want to say yes, but this is. This is probably as bad as it can get.
[00:18:30] So, up next for the team, Tuesday night they take on Winthrop before hosting LSU at home for the regular season finale. That series also will begin on a Thursday, I believe. Tuesday. We'll see. With the weather, regular season is coming to a close. It's going to be very interesting to see what comes out, if anything, from the athletic department.
[00:18:53] Yeah, tough weekend for the baseball team, but a fantastic weekend for the softball team. Don't lose sight of that. It really is remarkable to be hosting a regional. Shout out to them. Let's focus our energy there. But with that, that wraps up this episode, please follow me on social media, Twitter or X is Cox Gamecocks. 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.
