Clemson Baseball Update: Tigers win first ACC Series of the Season

Clemson baseball takes final two games against Florida State to win series.

It's been a rocky road so far for the 2023 Clemson baseball team. The Tigers were sitting at 17-14 following a series-opening loss in Tallahassee to Florida State, a team that is well below .500. Staring at the possibility of a fourth straight conference series loss Coach Erik Bakich and his players needed a momentum shift in the worst way. 

That shift began with Friday's dominant pitching performance by Ethan Darden, who was getting his first ACC start and made the most of it by going 5 innings with only 4 hits, 1 walk, and no runs allowed. That gave the offense, who got off to a slow start, time to string together 8 straight runs, including 3-run innings in both the 6th and the 8th to win by a final score of 8-1. Bakich said following the game, "I thought this was maybe our most complete game yet at a time when we needed it most."

Caden Grice (31) went 2-3 on Saturday with a grand slam. He also pitched 6.1 innings, earning the win

The question then became whether the Tigers could finish the job on Saturday and finally get over the proverbial hump with a series win. In this one, the offense took the lead early scoring 6 runs in the first 2 innings, punctuated by a Caden Grice grand slam in the 2nd that allowed the team to never look back. It just so happens that Grice was also pitching in this one and finished a solid line of 6.1 innings (a career-high) giving up only 2 runs on 5 hits and 2 walks while striking out 5. 

Anytime one player can give you that much production on both sides of the diamond there's a good chance you end up with victory and that's exactly what happened with a final score of 6-2. The series streak was over and the MVP of the game, Caden Grice, followed with an MVP-type interview giving all of the credit to his teammates. "My defense made a lot of plays," the starting pitcher said. "I attribute everything to them, they were making great plays all across the field and I couldn't ask for anything else." When asked about the grand slam Grice followed with "I mean 2 outs, loading the bases, getting walks I think that was a really big deal so I appreciate my teammates for doing that." We'll see if this momentum can carry over into Tuesday night when they take on Georgia in Athens.