Winners and losers, May 24-30

Todd Interdonato's teams hold the top
 five spots on Wofford's single-season
victories list. (Wofford photo)

Winners

* For South Carolina to get a host designation for the first round of the NCAA Tournament after its annual faceplant at the SEC Tournament moves the Gamecocks solidly out of the losers category for the week.

Named a couple of weeks ago as one of 20 schools being considered for 16 host spots, USC was perhaps a win over Tennessee in the final game of the regular season away from being "in" as a regional host and top 16 seed. Instead, Carolina went to Hoover needing a few wins - coupled with bad outings by some others - to sneak back in.  A lackluster outing in an opening-round loss to Alabama sent the Gamecocks back to Columbia to await their regional assignment -- likely on the road.

But the NCAA gave Carolina an early Christmas gift in the form of a host designation. USC will be a No. 2 seed, but the prospect of a Founders Stadium with several thousand Gamecocks fans may make any No. 1 seed Old Dominion wonder what it did to tick off the NCAA.

I'm glad to see USC will host, but I don't think it deserved it as much as some others. In a season where hosts were selected in the same fashion as before, I don't think the Gamecocks would be a host.

* More fans will get the chance to attend games in the NCAA Tournament. The NCAA will let sites be at full capacity if local regulations allow it.

* If I'm ever on trial, I'd like to have Wofford coach Todd Interdonato representing me. The Terriers coach won challenge after challenge upon review during Saturday night's Southern Conference Tournament game with Western Carolina. Twice, his successful appeals for reviews resulted in inning-ending outs being overturned. Once, Western Carolina turned an apparent double play, but the Catamounts first baseman continued action to throw home and get a Wofford runner out. A review of the play at first shows the runner to be safe. It seemed that the tag at home would replace the play at first as the third out. Instead, after a delay of almost 30 minutes that included umpires checking with NCAA officials, it was determined the Wofford runner slowed down after seeing the apparent out at first. Yes, Wofford lost, and yes, the game lasted more than five hours - believed to be the longest nine-inning game in NCAA history - but not before Interdonato did all he could to make sure his team got the proper calls. Wofford finished with 36 wins, his third team to do so. They share second place on the school's single-season victories list. Interdonato's club won 39 games in 2015.

* Presbyterian has caught a lot of flak - rightfully so, in my opinion - for dumping football coach Tommy Spangler after he guided the Blue Hose to a winning record, then never explaining its reasoning. The Big South Conference Tournament win by the Blue Hose baseball team, and the accompanying NCAA Tournament bid, will give coach Elton Pollock's team a chance to get some national press as one of the feel-good underdog stories. Pollock's team will face Vanderbilt in the Nashville Regional. Commodores coach Tim Corbin was Pollock's coach when he played at PC.

* Columbia International  became the third program from South Carolina - joining Anderson and North Greenville - to win a National Christian College Athletic Association World Series championship.

Losers

* I noted in this space last week that Clemson needed a whole lot of things to go its way to avoid its first losing season in more than six decades. Seven Louisville home runs were too much for the Tigera to overcome in Game 1 of the ACC Tournament. Under the ACC's ridiculous tiebreaker rule for pool play (higher regular-season finish decides the pool winner), the loss rendered Clemson's second game of pool play against Georgia Tech meaningless, except for pride purposes. Credit the Tigers for not mailing it in, hammering the Yellow Jackets behind two triples and an inside-the-park home run by Bryce Teodosio.

* I'm not a big fan of the single-elimination first round in the SEC Tournament, but at least every game there is meaningful in determining the tournament champ. That's not the case in the ACC or Sun Belt, where pool play is used. All four semifinal spots in the Sun Belt Tournament were wrapped up before Friday's pool play games. Only one of four ACC spots was still up for grabs on the last day of pool play. I'd rather see something other that higher regular-season finish determine pool play ties. There are several steps that I  would use.

1. fewest runs allowed in pool play.
2. largest run differential in pool play.
3. most runs scored in pool play.
4. fewest offensive strikeouts in pool play.

If there's still a tie after all that, I'm OK with going back to regular-season finish.

A little of both

* Florence-Darlington Tech had a superb season end too quickly when it went two-and-out at the NJCAA World Series in Grand Junction, Colo. The Stingers (46-8) had an uncharacteristic power failure in Game 1, being held to five singles in a loss to McLennan. Then, they had to misfortune to be paired against No. 1 seed Crowder in an elimination game. Still, Tech took an early lead and was up 6-3 until Crowder erupted for six runs in the eighth and held on for a 9-8 win.  As disappointed as coach Preston McDonald and his team may have been in the immediate aftermath, in time they will look back and cherish their trip to the national stage. Hundreds of coaches and players would love to have even a brief opportunity.