ARLINGTON, Texas — One of the bigger moves Erik Bakich made over the offseason was dipping into the transfer portal to add Dominic Listi to the Clemson roster.

Listi spent his first four seasons at North Central College before transferring to Indiana State for the 2024 season. The outfielder was a .348 career hitter over those five seasons.

While at North Central, Listi produced a 72-game on-base streak, good for third longest in Division III history.

It’s those kinds of numbers that piqued Bakich’s interest in the first place and over his first two games, Listi is already proving he fits right in at Clemson. On the field and off of it.

“Didn’t really know what to expect,” Listi said after the win over Arizona. “But since the moment I got here, everyone just accepted me with welcoming arms. The culture here is truly special. I just love playing with everybody here and love the fan base as well. It’s been amazing.”

During the 2-0 start, Listi has been a sparkplug for the Tigers’ offense. The graduate transfer had an RBI knock in his debut with Clemson in Friday’s comeback win over Oklahoma State.

In Saturday’s 16-5 throttling of Arizona, Listi really made his presence felt. The left-handed hitter had two base hits in the first inning alone, including a two-run single that put the Tigers up 7-0 in their very first at-bat of the contest.

Listi finished the afternoon 3-for-5 with four RBI. He reached base four times from the leadoff spot and scored two runs.

However, he is just one key piece in a lineup that doesn’t appear to have a single weak spot.

“We feel like we’re absolutely stacked as a team,” Listi added. “Like Coach Bakich said, there’s like 14 guys on our team that deserve to be playing every single day. So we just all go out there and give everything we can as a team every single time, and all the individual effort that we put in comes together great as a team.”

While pushing across 16 runs in one game is impressive on its own merits, the Clemson offense did it without the benefit of the long ball. The Tigers pounded Arizona pitching to the tune of 17 total hits, with 11 of those being singles and the other six being doubles.

In fact, during its first two wins, the Clemson offense has yet to hit a home run and Listi believes that manufacturing runs the old-fashioned way is something this offense will excel at in 2025.

“It shows that everything we do as a team works,” Listi said. “That’s the approach we have as a team, just fighting every single pitch, trying to win every single pitch. It’s not a cliche. It’s truly what we do and it really shows out on the field.”

Clemson will finish up play in the Shriners Children’s College Showdown on Sunday. The Tigers will square off with SEC foe Ole Miss at 3:30 pm.