HATTIESBURG, Miss. — Jacksonville State baseball will now need to win three games to advance out of the Hattiesburg Regional.
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The Gamecocks (47-14) fell into the losers bracket after an 8-6 loss to Little Rock on Saturday at Pete Taylor Park, setting up a rematch with Virginia in an elimination game on Sunday at 3 p.m. on ESPN+. Steve Bieser hasn't decided who he's going to start in that game.
"After seeing this club, I got to think about it a little bit. We got a few games ahead of us to win. We got to figure out how we can get off to a good start," Bieser said.
The Gamecocks have two weekend starters that haven't pitched yet this NCAA Tournament. Steven Cash and Eli Pillsbury haven't taken the mound after Beau Bryans and Ryan Geraghty earned the first two starts.
Even as they will need to win three straight games over two days, Bieser feels like only one other team could have matched the pitching depth that his Gamecocks had, and Southern Miss is already eliminated after going 0-2 as the host.
"I think we got plenty of pitching. We got to execute and we got to pitch well like we pitched all season. We've got plenty of pitching to play three games. For three games, I feel like the only other team that could match us is out of the tournament already as far as going deep and having to run that many games in a row," Bieser said.
If the Gamecocks beat Virginia, they will get a rematch with Little Rock at 8 p.m. on Sunday on ESPN+. If the Gamecocks can win that game, a winner-take-all showdown will be played Monday.
Maxwell Donaldson covers high school sports, Jax State athletics, the outdoors in Alabama and more for the Gadsden Times and USA TODAY Network. Find him on Twitter/X @_Max_Donaldson and contact him at [email protected].
This article originally appeared on The Gadsden Times: Does Jacksonville State baseball have enough pitching to win NCAA Tournament Regional