Pitching once again carried the day for Clemson’s baseball team, leading the Tigers to an unblemished spring against their in-state rival for the first time in more than two decades.

It wasn’t easy as South Carolina routinely threatened in the series finale Sunday at Doug Kingsmore Stadium, but five Clemson pitchers combined to work out of one jam after another in a 5-2 win for the Tigers, who stayed unbeaten on the season after winning the first two games of the series in Columbia by a combined score of 13-4.

Cooper Ingle’s solo home run – the first of his Clemson career – and Jonathan French’s RBI single in the home half of the eighth inning provided some insurance for the Tigers (11-0), who notched their first sweep of Carolina since 1999. It was the Tigers’ first sweep of at least three games against the Gamecocks since 1996 when Clemson beat them four times.

“To find a way to sweep the Gamecocks was just one of those things I’ll never forget and just a special moment in a program,” Clemson coach Monte Lee said.

Ryan Ammons retired six of the eight batters he faced over the final two innings, wiggling out of one last bit of trouble to notch a six-out save. Carolina (7-4), which outhit Clemson 10-6, put two runners on in the ninth with a one-out single from Talmadge LeCroy and a two-out knock from Michael Braswell.

But Clemson shaded Braylen Wimmer up the middle, which paid off when Carolina’s 3-hole hitter sent Ammons’ 1-1 offering back up through the box. Mac Starbuck, who came on a defensive substitution at second base, snagged Wimmer’s hot shot and stepped on second to finish off the Tigers’ third sweep of the season in front of 6,636 fans, the largest crowd in the history of Doug Kingsmore Stadium.

“All we want to do is win every single game. That’s all we want,” said Ingle, who’s hit safely in every game this season. “And to do it against a great team like South Carolina, that really says a lot about our will to win as a team.”

Dylan Brewer went 2-for-3 and knocked in a pair of runs with a two-out single as part of Clemson’s three-run fourth, but offense was largely hard to come by for the Tigers. Clemson left seven runners on base, but the pitching staff again helped the Tigers keep Carolina at bay.

Right-hander Nick Clayton allowed just one earned run on four hits in 4 ⅔ innings before Alex Edmondson, Jackson Lindley, Jay Dill and Ammons took over from there. Edmondson came on in relief first and induced a groundout from Carolina’s leading hitter, Andrew Eyster, to limit the Gamecocks’ damage to one run in the fifth.

Lindley, who got the win after hurling 1 ⅔ scoreless innings, relieved Edmondson after Carolina’s first two batters reached in the sixth, but he retired three of the next four hitters to keep Clemson’s one-run lead intact at the time. The right-hander got Wimmer to roll into a double play for the first two outs in the seventh before Dill came on to fan Eyster to end the Gamecocks’ half of the frame.

“The biggest difference for us this year is our guys have just been pounding the strike zone,” Lee said. “I don’t think there’s any secret sauce to it. We don’t necessarily worry about the runners being on base or talk about it or anything like that. Our guys just focus on the process of executing pitches and pounding the strike zone. Winning counts and getting ahead, and that’s what they’ve been doing.”

Carolina stranded 10 baserunners and went just 3-for-12 with runners in scoring position, continuing a weekend-long trend for Clemson’s pitching staff. The Tigers held Carolina to 4 of 29 with runners in scoring position and 6 of 53 with runners on in the series.

In limiting the Gamecocks to no more than two earned runs in all three games, Clemson lowered its earned run average to 2.34 on the season.

“We have so many guys that we can use in so many situations,” Clayton said. “We all trust in each other and believe in each other, so nobody’s trying to do too much. I think last year we got caught up in trying to do too much with certain guys in certain situations. This year, it’s just do what we can and then pass it to the next guy.”

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