Gamecocks ride Jack Mahoney, homers to series-clinching win over No. 3 Gators
There’s something bordering on wild about watching Jack Mahoney dip and dice his way through Florida’s lineup. It’s not in his hulking 6-foot-3 frame. Nor his fastball that touches up to to 95 mph on occasion. Rather, it’s in the way he saunters off the mound, spewing fire one extinguished Gator threat at a time.
On Friday, Mahoney flung a wild pitch to allow a Florida run and push another runner to third in the middle of the fifth inning. Resetting, he fired toward Gators catcher BT Riopolle, inducing an inning-ending double play and stranding a pair of runners.
Strutting off the bump, Mahoney pointed his right hand skyward. He let out an emphatic “WOOOOO,” his entire torso convulsing with adrenaline. He looked toward catcher Jonathan French midway through his walk to the dugout and simply nodded.
It wasn’t always pretty. It certainly wasn’t perfect. But Mahoney found enough groove to pace No. 6 South Carolina (33-6, 12-4 SEC) to a series-clinching 5-2 win over No. 3 Florida (31-9, 11-6 SEC) in front of a sold-out Founders Park.
“His energy really feeds the whole dugout, feeds the whole crowd,” said reliever Eli Jones, who tossed three innings of three-hit ball behind Mahoney. “Jack’s such an animated guy. You love him. He’s an awesome human. He has everybody’s back and that’s why it’s so easy to have his back.”
On a Gamecocks pitching staff loaded with front-end talent, it’s easy to forget Mahoney’s place. Will Sanders is the certified ace — ebbs and flows this year aside. Noah Hall, who pitched as well as anyone on the staff in 2022, would be a No. 1 on most teams in America.
And then there’s Mahoney.
The Illinois native came into his college career as a legitimate two-way option. Pitching stuck. He’s had flashes as the usual Sunday guy this spring. He went six innings in back-to-back starts against Bethune-Cookman and Georgia. A five-inning outing at Mississippi State, too, had its moments.
Friday night, though, was something different. One week after an up-and-down start at No. 4 Vanderbilt, Mahoney battled through momentary lapses for one of his more anecdotally impressive outings of the year. The stats were solid: five innings pitched, two earned runs, three walks, three strikeouts. But that resolve — a similar form to what Sanders flashed the previous night — was what carried South Carolina.
Mahoney watched his fifth pitch of the night get blasted onto Williams Street by Florida slugger Nic Calianone. No matter. Mahoney tuned around, forced a groundout and rang up Riopelle to end the threat.
That form followed into the fourth inning, where Mahoney allowed a single and double, leading to runners at second and third with just one out. An acrobatic over-the-shoulder catch by Braylen Wimmer just onto the outfield grass behind second base notched the second out. Mahoney ended the frame forcing Florida outfielder Ty Evans into a groundout to short.
Clenching both fists and shouting, “Yeahhhhhh!!” toward the Gamecock dugout, he exited the diamond.
“(Mahoney and Sanders) know that in the middle of a big crisis like that — when the bases get loaded, or you got runners in scoring position — the key is to kind of slow down a little bit, breathe a little bit better and just execute pitches,” USC coach Mark Kingston said. “They’ve both pitched enough, they’re old enough now and they’re competitive enough now that they know how to do that. They know how to get out of those tough spots.”
South Carolina’s bullpen, too, backed up Mahoney’s effective start with its share of flare.
Jones worked himself into a smidge of trouble in the sixth inning off a pair of singles. But with a mix of speeds and a fastball painting 92 mph, he forced a pop-up and a swinging strikeout to end the threat.
Like Mahoney, he popped off the mound, beating his chest and yelling toward the Gamecocks’ bench.
“That’s what you kind of live for,” Jones said. “I grew up my whole life dreaming to be in that moment and to get the opportunity to actually do it and and perform and execute a pitch and strike them out; it’s just what you look forward to your whole life.”
Where Mahoney’s — and perhaps Jones’ — performance was a bit surprising, the South Carolina offense carried on its hot-hitting 2023 standard against tricky Gators righty Hurston Waldrep.
Less than 24 hours after ending Thursday night’s run-rule win with a double to the center-field wall, Cole Messina matched Caglianone’s first inning bomb by belting a two-run shot four rows into the upper-deck bleachers in left field.
Ethan Petry followed suit one frame later, smashing a three-run homer into the chairbacks in left field for his 20th homer of the season. Petry, now hitting a torrid .426 on the year, is just seven long balls shy of Tommy White’s freshman home run record with 16 regular-season games remaining.
“Our scouting report on (Waldrep) was to see the ball up,” Petry explained. “I ended up seeing a splitter up and I hammered it.”
South Carolina enters Saturday’s matinee with a series win in its pocket and a feeling that a few more SEC wins may well have the Gamecocks locked up as one of the nation’s top eight seeds come tournament time, guaranteeing Columbia would host a regional and potential super regional.
Mahoney’s effort on the heels of Sanders’ resurgent start on Friday night should also quell doubts about what the USC rotation is sans Noah Hall, who’s continuing to rehab from a back injury that has sidelined him since the Mississippi State series in late March.
There have been moments to temper expectations this spring. It’s time to throw that out the door. South Carolina looks the part of a real contender and that should scare all of college baseball.
Next South Carolina baseball game:
Who: No. 6 South Carolina vs. No. 3 Florida
Where: Founders Park — Columbia, SC
When: 2 p.m. Saturday, April 21
TV: SEC Network Plus
