Noah Hall Wins Pitchers Duel, Leads Gamecocks To Series-Clinching Victory

South Carolina won their second straight closely contested game against the Penn Quakers, thanks largely to a masterful performance by Noah Hall.

Mark Kingston and the South Carolina Gamecocks have faced stiffer competition this weekend in the Penn Quakers. With how game one unfolded, with five of the Gamecocks' seven runs coming in one inning, the coaching staff had to believe that a low-scoring was a distinct possibility shortly. 

That's exactly what occurred at Founders Park on Saturday afternoon, as starting pitchers Noah Hall and Cole Zaffiro for South Carolina and Penn, respectively, battled it out for the majority of the ball game.

For Noah Hall, most of his quality matchups against the Quaker bats on this overcast day were kickstarted by his fastball, which led to Hall getting ahead of the count quite frequently. Noah then used his changeup to compliment his fastball, and its late drop threw Penn's batting lineup even more off-balance, leading to Hall getting twelve strikeouts while not walking a single Quaker.

One area of concern coming out of this game for the Gamecocks is their fielding in the infield, as both Will McGillis and Noah Hall committed an error that led to a free baserunner for the Quakers in the second and seventh inning. 

On both occasions, the Penn baserunner eventually reached third by stealing at least one bag as catcher Cole Messina struggled to get the ball cleanly out of his glove in a couple of instances. Still, the Gamecocks persisted, keeping the Quakers from scoring in either scenario.

For Monte Lee and the Gamecock hitters, this was their least eventful performance to this point in the season, partially due to fantastic appearances by Penn pitchers Cole Zaffiro and David Shoemaker, who struck out twelve Gamecocks in their own right. South Carolina was also a touch snake-bit in terms of the long ball, as the dreary weather conditions and lack of outward breeze saw five different hits either die out at the warning track or hit the wall.

The sole run for the game was scored by freshman sensation Ethan Petry, who's quickly established himself as one of the Gamecock's best all-around hitters to start this season. Relief pitcher Matthew Becker would come on the mound in the ninth inning and carryover the success of Noah Hall, getting one out via a pop-up in foul territory while striking out the final two batters to secure the series win for South Carolina.

Game three of the series will take place tomorrow at 1:30 pm et on SEC Network Plus.

You Might Also Like:

• Mahoney Dominant In Emotional Return To Pitching Mound
• Home-Run Barrage, Dominant Pitching Lead Gamecocks To Victory
• South Carolina Obliterates UMass-Lowell On Opening Day

Join the community:

• Follow Andrew Lyon on Twitter: @ALyon_SC
• Follow Christian Dart on Twitter: @ChristianJDart
• Follow Fisher Brewer on Twitter: @USCTalk
• Follow Locked On Gamecocks on Youtube or wherever you get your podcasts

You can follow us for future coverage by clicking "Follow" on the top right-hand corner of the page. Also, be sure to like us on Facebook @GamecocksDigest & follow us on Twitter at @GamecocksDigest.