LYNCHBURG, Va. – It's necessary! Jacksonville State forced a 'If necessary' game with Dallas Baptist on Saturday afternoon with an 11-7 win on Worthington Field at Liberty Baseball Stadium in the 2025 Conference USA Baseball Championship.

The two teams will play the game on Saturday night at 6:30 p.m. CT. The game will be streamed on ESPN+ and carried on the Gamecock Sports Network. The winner advances to Sunday's CUSA Championship game against No. 2 Western Kentucky.

The Gamecocks combined a solid start on the mound from Karson Bonaparte and the offense collected a season-high and the most by a team in the championship this week with 17 hits off Patriot pitching.

Bonaparte tossed 6.1 innings before a liner that hit him forced the Gamecocks to go to the bullpen. It was the longest outing of the season for the junior righty. He was touched for just three hits and two earned runs.

He pitched with a lead as the Gamecocks scored five runs over the first three frames and added a sixth run on the first home run of the tournament by Jax State. All of the six runs came with two outs.

After DBU battled back to make it a one-run contest heading to the ninth. Jax State put together a big inning for insurance. It was a similar situation as last Saturday at WKU with the Gamecocks nursing a one-run lead in the seires-clinching win over the Hilltoppers. Junior Grayson Ashe powered a two-run home run just inside the left field foul pole. The Gamecocks took advantage of miscues by DBU with three more runs in the inning.

Redshirt junior Jackson Sleeper, who picked up the win over Louisiana Tech in the tourney opener, collected his seventh save of the season.
Redshirt sophomore Cooper Blauser led the Jax State hitting attack with his second four-hit game of the championship. He was one of five Gamecocks to have multiple hits off DBU arms.