Coastal Baseball opens 2018 season

February 21, 2018

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Morgen Cvetko

The Coastal Carolina baseball team finished Sunday with a 3-0 record to start the 2018 season after a crushing opening day win over Virginia Tech and back-to-back walk-off wins against #19 Oklahoma and Kansas State. 

The Chanticleers opened their season with a 17-2 win over Virginia Tech, the same scoreline that the 2016 National Championship team opened that season with. 

Woody Woodall opened the scoring for the Chanticleers in the first inning with a two-run home run. Woodall talked about what it was like to get a home run on his first swing of the season. 

“It felt great,” Woodall said. "I’ve been feeling great in intrasquads leading up to the season, just kind of ready to face some new guys, honestly. I had a chance to do that and felt great in the box." 

Kieton Rivers extended the lead for the Chanticleers with a solo home run in the fourth and Cameron Pearcey scored off a single by Corey Wood. The bullpen of Virginia Tech seemed to have fallen apart at this point as the Chanticleers scored three straight runs off of bases loaded walks, making the score 7-0 at the end of the fourth.  

At the start of the bottom of the seventh inning, the score was 9-2 in favor of Coastal but the Chanticleers still had some offense left in them as the team would score six more runs to make it 15-2.  

Seth Lancaster would homer in the eighth inning and the Chants would add another run to make it 17-2 when it was said and done on Friday night at Springs Brooks Stadium. 

Head Coach Gary Gilmore was extremely impressed by sophomore Keaton Weisz, who up until this year was ineligible to play due to NCAA standards.  

“He gets a big hit to get the offense going, and woody follows him and gets a homerun, and it was really cool to watch and I am so happy for him,” said Gilmore.  

On Saturday, the Chanticleers second game of the season against #19 Oklahoma was close one. At the top of the eighth inning Oklahoma tied the score up to 3-3. Neither team could get a runner home until the 10 inning and Corey Wood got a hit that allowed pinch runner Turner Buis to score making the final score of the game 4-3.  

To close out the weekend, Sunday was almost the exact same situation as the night before – with the Chants letting a 3-0 slip late but closing out the night with a walk-off win. 

The Chants allowed two runs in the top of the ninth inning to let Kansas State tie things up a 3 runs apiece and for the second straight night, there would be extra baseball in Conway. Woodall, who on opening day racked up six RBI's, would be the hero in the bottom of the 10th inning, smashing a ball up the left field line and Wood scored to end the night with another 4-3 victory for the Chanticleers.