Kingston Looks Ahead To Regionals, Discusses Hosting Possibility

South Carolina's Baseball coach Mark Kingston talked to the media about what's to come for the team and whether or not his team deserves a national seed.

After going through the first 40 games of the season with very few blemishes and a 34-6 overall record, the South Carolina Gamecocks wound up finishing the season on the losing end of 13 of their last 18 games. One of the major negative trends in the aforementioned 18 game stretch has been the team's lackluster offensive numbers, as Carolina has scored 2.36 runs per game on average in each of their last 11 conference losses.

This includes South Carolina's porous showing against Texas A&M on Thursday, where they were shut out and only recorded one hit in nine innings, leading to questions about the team's offensive woes after the game.

"We don't have time to be concerned. We have to get to work and try to recapture that magic," Mark said. "We need to get all of those guys that were really important to make us an elite team back going all at once. We've got one week to figure it out and try to get those guys going."

With the loss to A&M the Gamecocks, finish one win shy of 40, a number that's typically viewed as a magic number for teams vying for a regional host. Still, Coach Kingston believes the overall body of work speaks for itself.

"I think if you look at full picture, yes absolutely. If I had watched us over the last few weeks, I would understand why there are concerns. I'm not gonna stand up here and bang the table for why I think we should be a host, I think the numbers speak for themselves very loudly."

One other concern about the Gamecocks potential to host a regional is how many slots the SEC will get from a committee that might be persuaded to avoid an SEC laden group of national seeds so as to avoid calls of bias. The Gamecocks head man had no issue addressing his point of a merit-based decision versus one made purely on the idea of perceivable fairness to the rest of the conferences.

"An SEC athlete should not be penalized for being on one of the teams that deserves and has earned a spot in the NCAA Tournament," Kingston explained. "Just because of the conference affiliation, it shouldn't hurt you good or bad. If you're one of the best sixteen teams, I think the student-athletes have earned it and deserve it."

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