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June 3, 2006
South Carolina Notes
South Carolina is making its seventh consecutive NCAA Regional appearance and eighth under head coach Ray Tanner. USC has advanced to the Super Regional five of the last six years.With today’s win, South Carolina stands at 38-22 overall and 2-2 in games played at neutral sites. USC has won three of its last five games.South Carolina improves to 81-46 (.638) in postseason play in its 22nd NCAA Tournament appearance.South Carolina is now 25-9 this season when scoring first and 32-4 when leading entering the seventh inning.This was the first-ever meeting between South Carolina and Evansville in the sport of baseball.Freshman RHP Mike Cisco pitched his first-career complete game, going the full nine innings, allowing six hits and two runs, one of which was earned. It was the second-straight start Cisco had gone at least eight innings. In his last start he went eight innings, allowing three hits and one run in a victory over Kentucky in the SEC tournament. Cisco’s complete-game was the first complete-game victory of the season for South Carolina and just the second complete game of the season by a USC pitcher. Wynn Pelzer went the distance in a 5-4 loss to Tennessee on May 12.Freshman Justin Smoak had two doubles in the win over Evansville, one short of his season-high of three doubles vs. Furman on May 16.South Carolina will play Virginia on Saturday night at 7 p.m. It will be the first meeting between the two teams since March 15, 1987, a game USC won 7-3 in Columbia, S.C. The last meeting between the two schools in Charlottesville, Va. Was on April 17, 1970 when Virginia won 2-1.
Evansville Notes
Evansville is making its third NCAA Regional appearance and first under head coach Dave Schrage.With today’s loss, Evansville stands 40-21 overall and 7-5 at neutral sites. UE has won 14 of its last 16 games.Evansville’s 40 wins are the most since 2000 (41). The Purple Aces have eclipsed the 40-win mark five times in school history.This was the first-ever meeting between Evansville and South Carolina in the sport of baseball.Senior RHP Adam Rogers made his 17th start of the season today against South Carolina. He is now tied for the most starts in a single season. He stands 7-5 overall with 81 strikeouts.DH Pat Tumilty leads the squad in runs with 50, including both runs scored against South Carolina.Evansville Single-Season Record Watch:
| Kasey Wahl | ||
| Has: 86 Hits | Record is: 90 | Needs: 4 |
| 18 Doubles | 25 | 7 |
| Pat Tumilty | ||
| Has: 12 Homeruns | Record is: 20 | Needs: 8 |
South Carolina Quotes
Jim Toman, associate head coach
On today’s win:
“Obviously it’s huge to get the win because we didn’t want to turn around and play right away. Now we get to go back to the hotel, get some rest, come back here and we’re in a good position.”
On Mike Cisco’s performance:
“It’s huge to get the win because we didn’t have to use the bullpen. Mike (Cisco) did a heck of job. Starting pitching is the name of the game. I believe Evansville had averaged 7 ½ runs per game in their last 12, so for Mike to shut them down in the first game of a regional, when they had won 15 of their last 16. That’s huge.”
On South Carolina’s defense:
“We’re starting five freshmen in a regional and other than the ball of Mike’s glove, we didn’t make an error. We did enough offensively to win, but we played very well defensively. They like to play small ball, push, drag and hit and run, but we did a good job taking away their running game.”
On head coach Ray Tanner being sick:
“When we had breakfast this morning he was still in bed. We didn’t know he’d be here until we got here and he was sitting in a chair in the dugout. He’s still not feeling well, but it takes a lot to keep him away from the ballpark. He did the same things he usually does, he just didn’t yell as much.”
Mike Cisco, freshman pitcher
On getting the win:
“Being a freshman and pitching in my first-ever regional was pretty exciting. I just tried to go out and my team in a good situation to win the game. My stuff was working, I had a good curve and I was spotting up using both sides of the plate.”
On pitching his first-career complete game:
“My arm felt good, I might have been a little tired at the end, but I was ready to finish. I wasn’t going to let anyone else finish the game for me. Being competitive, you never want to come out.”
On having the arm strength to finish the game:
“This is the longest I’ve gone in a game, but I’ve worked up to it with a good pace all year. I’ve gone 7 innings a few times, 8 innings and 8 1/3 a couple of times. I’ve built up to it, that’s what got me to have the arm strength at the end.”
Justin Smoak, freshman first baseman
On his two doubles:“I got good pitches to hit and fortunately they fell for me.”
On facing Virginia ace Sean Doolittle Saturday night:
“We’re very excited to face him. We faced good pitching all year in our conference, so we just need to go out there and see what we can do. We’re looking forward to it.”
Evansville Quotes
Dave Schrage, head coach
On USC pitcher Mike Cisco:
It was a gutty performance, that’s for sure. He was up around 140 pitches. We thought that late in the game we could get to him; we almost did. He made some great pitches, especially the walks- to get out of that situation. I thought that was one of the crucial at-bats when we hit into the double play.
We couldn’t get anything on him for the first three innings. I thought he pitched extremely well.
On team’s hitting:
We are a patient hitting team. We weren’t as aggressive as I would have liked early in the game.
On pitcher Adam Rogers:
Adam’s a gutty kid; that’s how he pitches. Uncharacteristically of our team, we gave up two runs right off the bat on errors.
On facing Lehigh next:
No, we haven’t been in this situation. We lost the first game of the Missouri Valley tournament and had to turn around and play the next day, but we did not have to turn around and play a double-header. In fact, we’ve only played one double-header all season. It was against Wichita State when we had a rain-out.
I’m confident with our kids going into the (Lehigh) game. They’ll play hard this game. We’ve played with our backs against the wall all year.
On offense against USC:
The way we came out offensively, I was a little disappointed. I thought we’d be a little bit more aggressive in the first couple of innings. I think part of that was Cisco’s slider. We hadn’t seen it and the second time through the (batting) order I thought we started getting better swings off him. We weren’t as aggressive as we needed to be early in the game.