Southern Miss Shuts Out Charlotte, 13-0
May 21, 2003 | Baseball
May 21, 2003
NEW ORLEANS - Southern Miss tied a Conference USA Tournament single-game record with seven doubles as the top-seeded Golden Eagles cruised to a 13-0 win over No. 8 seed Charlotte at Tulane's Turchin Stadium on Wednesday.
Southern Miss, Conference USA's regular season champion, improves to 42-14 overall with the win, while Charlotte drops to 21-27 with the loss. The game was shortened to seven innings by virtue of the 10-run rule.
The Golden Eagles wasted little time getting on the scoreboard, scoring three runs in the bottom of the first, two coming courtesy of a Clint King double. King added a solo home run in the third to push Southern Miss' lead to 4-0 and the Eagles added two more in the fourth to build a 6-0 cushion.
Charlotte had trouble getting its offense going, recording four hits on the afternoon. The 49ers had just five baserunners, but hit into a pair of double plays and had one runner caught stealing.
Southern Miss broke the game open in the fifth, scoring seven runs on seven hits, four of them coming on doubles as the Eagles batted around. King was hit by a pitch to start the inning and then drove in a pair of runs with a double.
King finished the day 3-for-3 with five RBI and a pair of runs scored. Five other Eagles had at least two hits, while Matt Shepherd, Brad Willcutt and Beau Griffin all drove in a pair of runs.
Starter Bob McCrory picked up the win for Southern Miss, improving to 10-2 after allowing just three hits and recording eight strikeouts through six innings. Zachary Treadway took the loss for Charlotte, falling to 8-5. He gave up eight hits and allowed six earned runs in four innings of work.
Southern Miss will face Houston in a winner's bracket game at 4 p.m. on Thursday, while Charlotte will meet East Carolina in an elimination game at 9 a.m. on Thursday.
NOTES:
With three hits, USM's Clint King extended his hitting streak to 11 games.
This marked just the second time in 11 years that Charlotte has lost its opening round game of a conference tournament, dating back to its days in the Metro Conference.
Charlotte 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 - 0 4 0Southern Miss 3 0 1 2 7 0 x - 13 15 0
