No. 18 South Carolina at Mississippi State, game 2 recap: Rally falls short, Gamecocks fall to Bulldogs 7-5

I'm running out of things to say in recaps that aren't "EVERYTHING IS TERRIBLE," but here we go.

The Gamecocks actually briefly had a lead in this game, going up 1-0 in the second inning when Elliott Caldwell belted a triple, then came home on an RBI groundout from Alex Destino.

Then came the rain, which didn't last very long, but drenched the field.

A little less than an hour later, play resumed. And things got bad for South Carolina.

On what should've been an easy ground ball third out, Jordan Gore made an error. From there, the Bulldogs went on to score six - SIX - unearned runs, putting them on top 6-1.

The Gamecocks got one of the runs back in the next inning, thanks to an RBI single from Kyle Martin.

Mississippi State got their seventh and final run in the fourth on an RBI single

DC Arendas went yard in the seventh to cut the score to 7-3, and South Carolina tacked on two more runs in the eighth inning. Gore led off with a single, Kyle Martin walked, and Caldwell doubled with one out to get Gore home. Another RBI groundout from Destino brought Martin across the plate, but that was all the Gamecocks could muster.

The second inning changed the whole complexion of the game, and was yet another instance in which poor defense hurt South Carolina this season. The offense was slightly more alive than in Thursday's game, although that's really not saying that much. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, the lack of fundamentals shown by this team is worrisome. As these losses continue to stack up, it's disappointing to see how many of them might've been avoided if not for the errors and lack of timely hitting.

The Gamecocks drop to 20-11 and 5-6 in the SEC, while the Bulldogs improve to 21-12 overall and 5-6 in conferenceplay. South Carolina will try to avoid getting swept (this is becoming an unpleasant trend) on Saturday. First pitch is scheduled for 3 p.m.