May 13, 2004

Charleston, SC - Their ninth-inning rally cut short in strange fashion, the South Carolina Gamecocks got it right in the 10th.

First baseman Steve Pearce belted a grand slam as No. 7 USC scored five runs in the 10th inning to break open a tense, well-played game and take a 6-1 victory over The Citadel before 4,618 fans at Riley Park.

USC, which got six strong innings from junior starter Cliff Donald, improved to 36-13. The Bulldogs, who could not convert on another impressive performance by freshman starter Justin Smith, fell to 30-21.

"The one thing that has remained constant this season is that our guys are playing hard," said USC coach Ray Tanner, whose team beat North Carolina in Fort Mill on Tuesday night and has won four straight games. "I kept telling them if you approached the game right, you will win your share. That ninth inning was tough for us, but we kept plugging away and found a way to win." The weird events of the ninth had the fourth-largest crowd to see The Citadel play baseball at Riley Park buzzing. With the game tied at 1-1, the Gamecocks appeared ready to win it then, as they thought they had loaded the bases with two out. But the bases never did get loaded.

With runners at first and second, pinch-hitter Hank Parks checked his swing on a 3-1 fastball. As home plate umpire Joe Marion called a strike, Citadel catcher Will Coker appealed to first base umpire Ritchie Tallent, who signaled that Parks did not swing. Parks, thinking he had walked, trotted toward first. The base runners, thinking the same thing, also started to move.

But Citadel reliever Ryan Owens, thinking quickly, threw to Chris Ard at third, and he tagged out USC runner Michael Campbell for a caught stealing and the third out.

After a lengthy argument from Tanner and a chorus of boos from Gamecock fans, the call stood.

"I thought it was a check swing, and the umpire called it a strike," Tanner said. "Our guys said they saw the first base umpire say no swing, ball four. So they moved up, but he ended up calling them out. A lot of crazy things happen in this game, and that was one of them."

Said Citadel coach Fred Jordan, "The home plate umpire yelled strike right off the bat. That's just baseball, those things happen sometimes."

The Gamecocks' 10th started innocently enough, as Steven Tolleson popped up a bunt that fell in for a single with one out. But then Kevin Melillo lofted a high fly ball down the right-field line, just where the wall juts out in front of Shoeless Joe's Hill. Citadel right-fielder Josh Stackley overran the ball slightly, the dropped it for an error. After an intentional walk to power-hitting catcher Landon Powell, Owens thought he had struck out Brendan Winn on a 2-2 fastball. He then walked Winn to force in the go-ahead run before Pearce's homer, his 14th, broke open the game.

Owens (0-1) took the loss in relief, and USC reliever Chad Blackwell (3-3) got the win.

But the Bulldogs' pitching star was Smith, who in just his second career start went 6-2/3 innings against the No. 7 team in the nation, allowing one run on seven hits and striking out two.

Jon Aughey staked the Dogs to a 1-0 lead in the fifth, curling his sixth homer around the left-field foul pole. The Gamecocks tied it in the sixth, when Melillo singled and scored on Winn's double off the wall in left-center.

-- The Citadel, in second place in the Southern Conference with an 18-6 record, starts a three-game series at Georgia Southern on Friday.

-- The crowd of 4,618, the fourth-largest to see the Bulldogs play at Riley Park, bumped an historic game from the list of top 10 Citadel crowds at Riley Park. The crowd of 3,584 at the first game at Riley Park, The Citadel vs. Western Carolina on April 7, 1997, had been No. 10.