Tiger pitching rolling into Oxford with a lot of confidence

The Clemson Tigers have proven throughout an up and down season that while offense sells the tickets, it is pitching that wins games.

CLEMSON-- The Clemson Tigers have proven throughout an up and down season that while offense sells the tickets, it is pitching that wins games.

There was never a more perfect example of that case of this point than what happened one week ago in Durham, North Carolina. 

Facing a must-win game against the No. 1-seeded Louisville Cardinals, Tiger pitcher Mat Clark carried a perfect game into the eighth inning, and no-hitter into the ninth, en route to a dominant 7-1 win.

Now, as the Tigers head into Oxford, Mississippi for the NCAA Baseball Tournament's Ole Miss Regional, the belief is the confidence gained by the Tigers will make them a dangerous team.

"I think we have a lot of confidence in our pitching staff right now," Clark said. "I mean our defense has been playing very good behind us which is helping us get us that confidence because they really make us comfortable in just throwing strikes and letting them make plays behind us."

Each of the last three season, the Tigers had earned the privilege of relaxing on selection Monday. As a regional host team, the only excitement for the Tigers was in learning the three teams that would travel to upstate South Carolina to continue their baseball season.

This year was different. 

The Tigers found themselves in a unique position this season. After stumbling over the second half of the season, the Tigers, for the first time in three years, were left waiting to learn their postseason fate from the selection committee.

"We're just grateful to get in. We had a tough stretch at the end of the year and we got a second chance, so we're going to go prove ourselves down there this weekend," Clark said. "I felt we were in the whole time. We finished the season on a pretty strong note, we got a couple pretty big wins here and there. We know we started the season good too, which also helps, and we had a decent RPI, I think. So all those factors came together and we got in."

Clark will not get the ball until Saturday, as the Tigers announced they will go with left-hander Jacob Hennessy in Game 1 of the regional against Illinois (Friday, 4 p.m.).

The decision to go with Hennessy instead of Clark was one that the coaching staff made as a whole based on a number of different reasons.

“We feel like for us we felt very good about all three of our starters going against Illinois and there were points to be made for starting all three,” head coach Monte Lee said. “But we are trying to win this regional and we felt like to set our pitching up the way we want to set our pitching up that going with Jacob in game one was the right move for our team and for us. It wasn’t all about the matchup with Illinois as it was just trying to set our pitching up with the goal in mind of winning the regional.

“We all know how important game one is, how critical winning game one is, but we also understand how critical winning game two is. So they are both very, very important. We made the decision to go with Hennessy with the mindset we are trying to win this regional.

But even though the Tigers' ace will not get the ball in the first game, Clark is confident that his teammates can get the job done and get him the ball.

"We got a lot of guys on this team that can get the ball and do their job and get us deep in the game," Clark said. "I think our guys are looking forward to it definitely. We haven't really had the outcome that we wanted to playing here the past couple years. It would have been nice to host again but we're going to take this opportunity and run with it.