Grayson Byrd hits hat trick in win over Charleston Southern

CLEMSON -- Are hat tricks allowed in baseball?

If so, Grayson Byrd just claimed one on a night to remember.

The junior third baseman made history by hitting three home runs to lead Clemson to a 5-0 win over Charleston Southern.

This was the 14th time a Clemson player hit three home runs in a game in school history, and the first time it’s happened since John Hinson did the honors against USC Upstate in 2010.

Clemson had four hits going into the bottom of the 8th inning. Three of them were Byrd home runs.

“Tonight, it was Grayson’s night,” Monte Lee said after his 16th win of the season.

The first came in the bottom of the 2nd inning when Byrd approached the plate with two outs and the game tied at zero. Byrd hit the second pitch he saw to opposite-field, barely inching over the 310-foot sign in left field thanks to some help from the wind.

He stopped at second because he was unaware it had left the yard.

All three of his home runs barely made it over the fence at Doug Kingsmore Stadium. His second home run in the 4th inning went the opposite direction, this sneaking over the right-field wall. The 3-run home run was Clemson’s second hit of the game and gave the Tigers a 4-0 lead.

Byrd said he had never hit three home runs in a game before. The last time he hit two home runs in a game, he remembered, was when he was ten years old. His teammates were obviously ecstatic before he stepped to the plate for the third time.

Second baseman Jordan Greene approached him.

“You won’t hit a third one,” Greene said jokingly.

“I’ll try for you,” Byrd replied.

Then, on a 2-2 pitch, Byrd made history.

He got a pitch up in the zone and drove it deep to centerfield, the third area of the park his ball hadn’t traveled to yet. Charleston Southern’s centerfielder had a play on the ball but jumped a bit too early, and the ball sailed over his outstretched glove just beyond the fence to give Clemson a 5-0 lead.

Byrd couldn’t help but chuckle.

“I rounded third actually and was laughing, so I had to put my head down,” Byrd said. “So I almost missed home. I was kind of a mess after that third one.

Fittingly, the bat Byrd used to hit those three home runs will never be used again. In his fourth plate appearance, he hit an opposite-field blooper that landed foul, but Byrd noticed something wrong with his bat.

“I walked back and looked at the handle, and it had kind of a crack,” Byrd said. “I went to bend, and it just kind of gave. My heart was broken a little bit.”

Patrick Cromwell gave Byrd his bat to borrow for the rest of the at-bat. He blamed Cromwell’s bat after he struck out swinging on the fifth pitch but looked up to see a strange sight:

Clemson fans giving him a standing ovation as he walked to the dugout after a strikeout.

“It’ll be nice if he could do it again,” Lee said with a grin.

But that wasn’t the only ovation of the night.

Freshman starting pitcher Holt Jones was on fire in his first start as a Tiger. He struck out the first seven batters he faced and had a no-hit bid going into the 6th inning.

Jones finished with eight strikeouts and only gave up two hits on 20 batters faced before he left the game to an ovation from the Tuesday night crowd.

Not bad for a first start.

“I was just trying to do as much as I could for the team and just throw as many strikes as possible,” Jones said.

With the bases loaded and one out in the 6th inning, Travis Marr came in and got out of the inning with two consecutive strikeouts. That was the closest Charleston Southern got to causing any damage all night.

Through 17 games, 17 Clemson pitchers have gotten playing time. After the shutout victory, the pitching staff gets to have its own batting practice tomorrow by tradition.

The Tigers moved to 16-1 on the season and remained undefeated at home thanks to Byrd’s bat and Holt’s bolts.