As the final weekend of regular season of baseball play at Founders Park is on the horizon, the university announced Tuesday morning that Founders Park would operate at 100% capacity for the last home weekend of the year, against #4 Tennessee. Reopening Founders Park completely comes after various teams in the Southeastern Conference and teams all over the US have begun reopening practices, with the Ole Miss Rebels reinstating full capacity a month ago, Tennessee starting it last week, and Florida operating at full capacity against the #1 team in the land, the Arkansas Razorbacks. This couldn’t come at a more convenient time for baseball programs, as these capacity restrictions are lifted usually before a monumental game or big series to end the year. The Rowdy Roosters of Founders Park have been waiting for this day and it’s finally here.  

A year and a half ago if you talked to me about full capacity at sporting events, I would probably shrug it off and not think much of it, simply because of how normal it was to have packed out stadiums. We were fortunate and took that for granted, so I’m extremely happy that full stadiums are back. After this season of college sports, you can know for sure that the atmosphere made by a full stadium means everything, and without it the team can play poorly or just have an overall flat atmosphere.  

Mark Kingston and the South Carolina Gamecocks will hope to use that home field advantage this weekend as they face one of the toughest teams they have played all season, the Tennessee Volunteers.