DURHAM, N.C. \u2014 There is no doubt in Louisville head Dan McDonnell\u2019s mind. Clemson is an NCAA Tournament team.
\nFor the second time this year McDonnell got an up close and personal experience as to why he thinks the Tigers are so good as they smacked his third-ranked Cardinals, 7-2, around Thursday in the ACC Tournament. The Tigers had already beaten Louisville, 9-1, on May 2 in Clemson.
\n\u201cThey were tough when we played them earlier,\u201d McDonnell said. \u201cThey beat us the first game and we beat them the next two, but they were close games. They\u2019ve got a good club, they\u2019ve got a couple really good starters, and offensively they\u2019ve got nice balance, they\u2019ve got a left-right combination and they\u2019ve got team speed.\u201d
\nClemson (32-26) used all of those things to run off Louisville ace and All-ACC First-Team pitcher Kyle Funkhouser after the fifth inning. The tall righty could not match the Tigers\u2019 relentlessness at the plate as they smacked him around for seven runs and 10 hits. He gave up five runs off seven hits in the loss at Clemson earlier this year.
\n\u201cI think us taking advantage of his mistakes is honestly what we did today. He left a couple of balls up and we were fortunate enough to put some good swings on it,\u201d Clemson second baseman Tyler Krieger said.
\nKrieger had two of those swings as he went 2-for-3 at the plate with one run drive in, a single to left field with two outs and two strikes in the bottom of the second inning. That gave the Tigers a 5-1 lead at the time.
\n\u201cI really tip my hat to them today because I thought they took a lot of quality at-bats,\u201d McDonnell said. \u201cI thought they really competed against, you know, we say one of the top pitchers in the country, and especially with two strikes.
\n\u201cThey were able to compete and move the ball. And if you put the ball in play, you\u2019ve got a chance, something good could happen and a lot of good things happened for them today.\u201d
\nClemson got two more runs on a two-strike hit, this time a double, in the fifth inning when Weston Wilson drove home Krieger and Chris Okey for a 7-1 lead at the time. Wilson finished the day 2-for-4 and his one-out double to centerfield ended Funkhouser\u2019s afternoon.
\n\u201cWe had some confidence coming into the game today because we had seen them before,\u201d Clemson head coach Jack Leggett said. \u201cWe had a really good approach. I think we had a really good plan about what we wanted to do and we executed it well in the first inning, second inning and got off to a good start. That got some confidence going.
\n\u201c(Funkhouser) threw a lot of off speed pitches, maybe more off speed pitches than I\u2019ve seen him throw, and we were able to manage those when he did make a mistake. But I thought we had a really good approach. We had some tough at-bats today in crucial situations with two outs, two strikes and men on base and all that type of thing. So getting big hits with men on base is really what it\u2019s all about and we did get some big ones early in the game and it loosened us up and kind of put them on the defensive.\u201d
\nAnd it proved how good of a team Clemson really is, which is what McDonnell already knew.
\n\u201cI just thought they played better than us in all three areas,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019ve got a good club, very good offense, and we just, you know, fell behind early and it was an uphill battle from there.\u201d<\/p>\n