Wichita State’s baseball team met a wall against Charlotte in its first game of the American Athletic Conference Championship.
Through the first four innings on Tuesday afternoon, the No. 7-seeded Shockers reached base only twice via a walk and a single. They also gave up six runs in those innings leading them to a 7-1 loss against the No. 2-seeded 49ers.
WSU (20-35) snapped a five-game winning streak with the loss and will move down to the double-elimination side of the AAC Championship bracket. The Shockers will face off against the loser of a game between No. 3 South Florida (USF) and No. 6 East Carolina (ECU) on Wednesday, which can be streamed on ESPN+.
“We have to show up tomorrow and see if we can extend this thing and get a day off,” WSU head coach Brian Green said.
Charlotte (36-20) extended its winning streak to 10-straight and will get a day of rest before playing its next game on Thursday. The 49ers will play the winner of the USF and ECU game.
Problems with pitching and hitting that plagued the Shockers through most of the regular season were on full blast against Charlotte.
WSU hit 4-for-28 and struck out 13 times during the game. The team went down 1-2-3 in six innings at the plate.
All of the strikeouts were delivered by the AAC Pitcher of the Year, Charlotte’s junior Blake Gillespie (7-4). He broke an AAC Championship record in single-game strikeouts with his performance. The previous record was set in 2021, when USF’s Jack Jasiak struck out 12 batters against Tulane.
Green said he’s looking forward to “never facing him on the mound again.”
“He was fantastic,” Green said. “He suffocated us at the plate. We actually knew what he was going to do with his pitch plan; I think everyone could see that in the ballpark. And we weren’t able to do anything with it.”
Senior Grant Adler (5-6) started on the mound for the Shockers and was the main culprit of Charlotte’s runs. He allowed the 49ers’ first six runs on eight hits in 2 1/3 innings pitched.
Sophomore Jeremiah Arnett replaced Adler in the third inning and provided some much-needed relief for WSU’s defense, as he gave up no runs on three hits in four innings. Sophomore Drew Iverson came in for Arnett and pitched 1 1/3 innings before junior Karsen Richard closed the game. Richard allowed Charlotte’s final run of the game in the eighth inning.
The 49ers scored their runs in the first, second, third and eighth innings. Coincidentally, all their runs were scored on singles.
They drove in their first run in the first inning on an RBI single, and in the second, they scored three more on back-to-back-to-back singles. In the third, Charlotte scored on another single, this time it was worth two RBI.
The Shockers’ only run came in the eighth inning after sophomore Camden Johnson hit a single that drove in sophomore Zeb Henry, who hit the game’s only triple in a previous at bat that inning.
“We found a little bit of barrel late in the game, but clearly (it wasn’t) enough,” Green said. “But that was nice to see us just continuing to try to fight. And I think it spoke to Blake (Gillespie) when we saw a new arm. There were a couple of really loud contacts pretty immediately … hopefully there’s a little bit of momentum at the plate going into tomorrow.”
With the loss, Wichita State will need to win the rest of its games in the AAC Championship if the team wants a shot at receiving an NCAA Regional bid. If the Shockers lose on Wednesday or at any point during the rest of the tournament, their season is over.
Green, however, doesn’t plan to have his season end on Wednesday.
“Our guys want to stay here, they want to compete,” Green said.
