By Will Vandervort.

By Will Vandervort

Jonathan Meyer did not have much time to think about his first start in 11 months for the Clemson baseball team. The senior found out he was going to be Clemson’s starter for Wednesday’s Gardner-Webb game on the bus ride home from Chapel Hill, NC Monday night.

The Tigers rolled back into Clemson around 3:15 Tuesday morning and less than five hours later he was up and getting ready for a 9 a.m. class.

“I really have not gotten my sleep since then because I had a full day of classes yesterday,” Meyer said.

Luckily for Clemson, the righty was going on adrenaline in Wednesday’s 4-1 victory over Gardner-Webb at Doug Kingsmore Stadium.  Meyer struck out six batters, walked none and allowed only one run on five hits in seven solid innings of work.  It was the San Diego, CA native’s best outing on the mound since going seven innings in a win at Maryland on April 21 of last year.

“I was excited,” Meyer said. “I came into the year, after the summer, I wanted to be a starter. That was the goal. I settled in as a reliever these past couple of weeks. I did not start off too well, but my arm has been coming back for me and my stuff has been working.”

Until Wednesday night, Meyer’s longest outing had been four innings, which he recorded two weeks ago in a relief role against Morehead State.

“He has a good breaking ball and he mixes things up with his fastball in the count sometimes,” Clemson head coach Jack Leggett said. “His breaking ball is very effective sometimes. He was throwing strikes tonight and was not walking anybody.

“He was getting ahead in the count and was doing a good job for us.”

Meyer cruised for much of the night against Gardner-Webb (15-13-1), allowing only three hits through the first six innings, while recording all six of his strikeouts. The Bulldogs did not get on the board until the top of the seventh inning after Clemson built a 3-0 lead.

“I always feel like my arm is good enough to go (a long time), but as a reliever you only get a chance to go one or two (innings) at a time, but I feel like I’m always going 100 percent all the time regardless if it is seven or two,” he said.

It was a good thing Meyer was effective as he was because Clemson’s bats did just enough to get the victory. The Tigers (18-11) totaled 10 hits and got a 2-for-4 night from catcher Garrett Boulware, including a two-run bomb to left-centerfield in the top of the first inning, but Leggett wasn’t pleased with his team’s execution.

Clemson had one runner thrown out at the plate and a second one thrown out at third base because it failed to execute a bunt properly.

“I did not like the way we played offensively tonight to be honest with you,” Leggett said. “We did not execute offensively and get runners over. We did not get that bunt down one time. We had a man on third base. We have to get him in.

“We have to do a better job, period. If we play like that, we are an average team. If we do a better job offensively, then we are pretty good so we have to be more aggressive in the middle of the week and we have to go up there this weekend and have our minds right.”

Up there is at Boston College, where the Tigers head Thursday morning for a three-game series which starts Friday afternoon. Though it is an early wakeup call—a 5 a.m. workout—there is one guy who is ready to get some sleep, and after Wednesday’s performance he deserves the rest.

“You get a lot of time to sleep on the plane,” Meyer said.