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BRIEFLY Inferno offering student discount The Columbia Inferno is offer ing discounted tickets to all USC students with valid student IDs for Friday night’s game at the Carolina Coliseum. It will be the last regular-sea son home game for Columbia, which is third in the East Coast Hockey League’s Southeast Division. The seats are located behind the goal and have obstructed views. Tickets are available at the Carolina Coliseum box office. Women’s tennis will play final road game Taking to the road for the finEil time this season, the 24th-ranked USC women’s tennis team looks to snap a three-match losing skid when they take on 30th-ranked Auburn on Friday afternoon at 2 p.m. The Lady Gamecocks (11-4,4-2 SEC) are looking to continue their hot play against Western Division I Hi MM USC at Auburn 2 p.m. Friday teams. USC is 4-0 this season against Western Division teams. Auburn is also 4-2 in the SEC, and it leads the division. Overall, the Tigers are 11-4. Carolina is battling for a top seed at the upcoming SEC Tournament, which will be held April 18-21 in Columbia. With just five conference matches remain ing, USC is tied for fourth in con ference wins. The Lady Gamecocks are two matches be hind Eastern Division co-leaders Florida and Georgia, which are both 6-0. USC concludes its road trip Sunday with a match against 33rd-ranked Alabama. The Lady Gamecocks then return home for their final three matches of the regular season. ■Nx. Mathis scores twice in Germany defeat Former Gamecock Clint Mathis scored a pair of goals for the United States men’s soccer team In its 4-2 loss to Germany on Wednesday night. The exhibition match, a warmup for this summer’s World Cup, took place in Rostock, Germany. Mathis scored the first goal of the match in the 17th minute and gave the U.S. a surprise 1-0 lead when he netted the ball off his own rebound. Germany would go on to score four straight goals, three of which were scored in a seven-minute span in the second half. In the 71st minute, Mathis cut the lead to two, taking a pass from Joe-Max Moore and burying it past the German goalkeeper. Mathis has scored at least one point in each of his last six starts for the U.S. He is coming back from a knee injury suffered last June. W$&4*'"r/. e' - ’ • te'.e'. ‘ ,' e v'i -' t . 1 a\W ‘ uave11111 11hMnH"viTmTI im 1 '*:■>, *TyJi iLXji IkB •• •"" llti'ilfl'lijiliBiill'illMWii.1 \.v ■■' c s"1' ^Wil^^^^^HMHiiiihaiiiiSiaifflE^B!MgiiMtjifi^fMS|B]BMHWHB lh.»> * fro ,, *. pue v use ' "^^^^^^^^^^^B4ilimTllHiMlliTl!1-i1ii[^iin^-e:i;l.;l4jf/iiJflM^1^W^M r> eN Hi r'l * I iih'1 u-he- ^^^^^^^^■gHBMnH>nipH!BnRHnRHPPPHPBBBHnil|B9BniBBBni^^^^pi^^B en ni a m e<^ ;;s; te aft g PHOTO BY AARON HARK/THE GAMECOCK Stacey Johnson, right, threw a one-hitter In the second game of USC’s doubleheader against East Tennessee State. Robyn Johnson checks her palm pilot. use snellacks ETSU BY MATT ROTHENBERG THE GAMECOCK The USC softball team took out its aggression Wednesday after noon against the East Tennessee State Lady Buccaneers. After a rough weekend against LSU, the Lady Gamecocks came home and shellacked ETSU 9-0 and 14-0 in a doubleheader. Winning these games should have brought back some confidence to the team, and that should be im portant as it heads into the remain der of a tough SEC schedule. “We struggled against a very good team (in LSU), butwe had a couple of good days of practice,” USC coach Joyce Compton said. “We just wanted to gain a little con fidence back. I think (the team) just had to go out and get back at it.” USC 9, ETSU 0 In the first game, USC senior pitcher Megan Matthews was sharp, notching 12 strikeouts in five innings for her fifth career no hitter. In those five innings, she only threw eight balls, and a po tential perfect game was spoiled only by hitting a batter. “I just went out, focused and threw my game. I felt really good today,” said Matthews, who im proved to 13-4. “I think this win was good for us. We really hit the ball well, and (we) look to carry it on against Tennessee.” USC got on the board in the first inning when Amber Curtis’ sacri fice fly brought in Jodi Fittro and Debralee Troesh’s groundout scored Kim Evans. The Lady Gamecocks added another pair of runs in the fourth inning, as Meghan Cornett scored on Samantha Jennings’ dou ble and Adrianna Baggetta came home on Fittro’s single. Following Baggetta’s fifth-inning RBI single, freshman Kristin Hall ended the game with a three-run home run, the first of her career. USC 14, ETSU 0 Stacey Johnson continued in the nightcap where Matthews left off. The sophomore tossed a one hitter as the Lady Gamecocks put a season-high 14 runs and 15 hits. “I think we came out wanting to do our best,” Johnson said. “Today, things happened to go our way.” Johnson (7-5) credited Matthews as being particularly helpful in her college career so far. “She’s very supportive,” Johnson said. “She helps me out and gives me confidence.” After scoring six runs in the first two innings, including a two run double by Cornett in the first inning and a two-run single by Troesh in the second inning, Carolina unloaded for seven runs on eight hits in the third inning. The Lady Gamecocks sent 13 bat ters to the plate in that inning, and each reached base at least once. Aleca Johnson capped the scor ing in the fourth inning with a solo home run, the first of her career. Cornett went 3-for-6 with three RBIs, three runs scored and a dou ble. She said the team “needed to stay aggressive and positive” after the weekend, and “we wanted to come back, play better, and... stay together, keeping a team spirit going.” USC goes to Knoxville next week to play Tennessee in a three game series. The Lady Vols will be no easy match, as fhey’re at or near the top of the SEC in several offensive categories. Against Tennessee, Compton said the keys are “going out and playing solid defense and being ag gressive at the plate while making them earn what they can get.” Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@hotmail.com Baseball CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 After a groundout advanced Dean and Coker, USC pitcher Matt Campbell took over for Rawl. Campbell walked right fielder Brook Dantzler to load tjie bases and was then relieved by Chris Spigner. Spigner’s first batter, David Griffin, launched a three run double to center field to give the Bulldogs a 5-0 lead. USC finally got on the board in the eighth inning, when Buscher led off with a double. Designated hitter Trey Dyson then popped out to shortstop, and catcher Landon Powell was walked to give the Gamecocks runners on first and second with one out. Matt Riddle, pinch hitting for center fielder Jon Coutlangus, died out to third base for the sec ond out, but shortstop Drew Meyer singled in Buscher to score what proved to be the only Carolina run of the game. Williams (1-3) picked up the win for The Citadel, while Carolina starter Rocky Evans (0-1) was charged with the loss. Carolina can now look ahead to the weekend, when it will play a three-game home series against the Crimson Tide (22-3). The Gamecocks have already won two series against ranked SEC oppo nents, winning two of three from both Florida and Mississippi State. Friday’s game will feature two senior aces. USC will send left hander Gary Bell (5-1) against righthander Lance Cormier (7-0). In seven wins, Cormier has a 0.98 ERA and two complete games. He is also averaging more than six strikeouts per game. Bell has a 3.89 ERA and averages six strikeouts per game. Friday’s game at Sarge Frye Field is set to begin 1 p.m. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@hotmail.com Allen CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 stocking stuffers (the Mariners) and, of course, a couple of duds (the Devil Rays). The long season stretches out like a blank canvas full of possibilities. Soon, your star pitcher will get hurt and your team will lose 10 games in a row. By Memorial Day, you’ll be thinking, “wait til’ next year.” But, for now, none of that matters because baseball has returned. So go ahead and get in front of the television this weekend to enjoy the American pastime. It’s a holiday without a boring family dinner, and you won’t have to take any of the presents back to the store. Buzzer Beaters It’s refreshing to see a long standing NCAA basketball tradition now spreading to the women’s game as well. I’m speaking, of course, of the referees’ preferential treatment of Duke players. In the Lady Gamecocks’ loss to the Dookies on Monday night, USC went to the free-throw line a total of six times in the entire game and scored only four points. Duke, however, collected 18 points from its 24 trips to the charity stripe and won by nine points.... With Dr. Palms’ departure, I would like to nominate Tony Kitchings for university president.... The new basketball arena had better have metal steps near the court. We need to ensure that “Basketball Jesus” can continue his thunderous “Gamecock Giddy Up” in our new digs.... I am now scared to go to the gas station for fear that Lou Holtz will jump into my car and yell at me. ...After Ball State’s performance last week, Dick Vitale finally stopped whining about the Cardinals’ exclusion from the NCAA Tournament. Forget the tournament; they looked more like the team the Harlem Globetrotters beat every night.... Syracuse once again proved again that good guys do in fact wear white.... After Andre the Giant’s death, who took over the day-to-day operations of maintaining his posse? Just wondering. Allen is a first-year electronic journalism student.