The winning beat goes on for the Bulldogs as they blanked No. 15 Texas A&M (20-8, 2-6 SEC) by a 3-to-0 score on Friday night. For No. 24 Georgia (21-6, 7-1 SEC), the victory—a two-hit shutout—was the 14th in its last 15 games, including nine wins in a row.

“We’re winning a lot of different ways,” head coach Scott Stricklin said following the victory. “We had some opportunities to extend that lead in a few of those innings. But, when you pitch and play defense like that, you can afford to leave some guys on base.”

The Bulldogs scored two of their three runs in the bottom of the second inning when, following singles by LJ Talley and Tucker Maxwell, Tucker Bradley also singled, driving in Talley. With one out in the inning, Aaron Schunk flew out, whereupon Maxwell tagged up and raced home to give Georgia an early 2-0 lead. Notably, the Bulldogs have outscored their opposition in the second inning this season, 28 to 4.

Holding the slim lead in the top of the fourth inning, Georgia’s pitching staff was dealt an apparent blow when starter Emerson Hancock suddenly collapsed on the mound while throwing ball four to the Aggies’ Hunter Coleman. According to Stricklin after the game, the pitcher’s knee buckled underneath him and hyperextended, forcing him from the contest. Before exiting, Hancock had pitched 3.1 innings, allowing no hits while walking two batters and striking out five.

In stepped sophomore righthander Tony Locey, who had pitched both in relief and as a starter during his Georgia career.

“My name was called, ‘Locey,’ and it’s just a matter of instinct—you just got to go,” Locey said. “I’ve kind of adapted the [reliever] role out of the bullpen. I like that [the team] brings me in in tough situations.”

Faced with the situation of a man on first with one out, Locey struck out Logan Foster and then got Will Frizzell to fly out to Maxwell in center field to end the inning.

In the bottom of the fourth inning with two outs, Georgia extended its lead to 3-0 when Bradley, who had already extended his streak of reaching base to 17 games, singled off of Aggie starter John Doxakis scoring Talley. Doxakis, who entered the game with a perfect 4-0 record and an SEC second-best 1.59 ERA, allowed eight hits and three earned runs in six innings.

With two outs in the top of the sixth inning, Texas A&M finally recorded its first hit when Braden Shewmake singled. However, Locey subsequently got Hunter Coleman to fly out to leftfield before forcing the Aggies to go three up, three down in the seventh inning. For the contest, in getting the win and improving his record to a perfect 5-0, Locey allowed one hit and no walks while striking out four batters in 3.2 innings.

To close out the game, Georgia pitched Zac Kristofak, who made his team-high 12th appearance, and Schunk, who tallied a team-best third save, in the eighth and ninth inning, respectively.

No matter what results from the teams’ third game of the series on Saturday, the victory gave Georgia its sixth consecutive SEC series win dating back to last season after the Bulldogs had dropped seven of their previous eight conference series prior to that. In addition, the shutout was Georgia’s third in a four-game span, marking the first time that had been accomplished by the Bulldogs since the 1980 season.

More so than milestones, however, was the prognosis of Georgia’s Hancock, whose record remains at 3-1 while his ERA lowered to 3.02 in a team-high seven starts.

“Well, we’re optimistic that it’s just a sprained knee, but we don’t know,” Stricklin said after the game. “He’s got to get evaluated tomorrow morning, get an MRI, and have the orthopedic [doctor] take a look at it. … We don’t feel like it’s the worse—like a serious injury. It could be a week-to-week thing. We’re hoping it’s a day-to-day thing. But, we’ll know more tomorrow.”

Until then, Georgia’s win over Texas A&M coupled with Florida’s victory over Vanderbilt the same night gave the Bulldogs a full-game lead over the Gators and Commodores, who both currently stand at 5-2 in the conference.

NOTES: Texas A&M’s Michael Helman, who entered the game with a .412 batting average, including .467 in the SEC, went hitless in four at bats. … Although a 12-game hitting streak of Georgia’s Michael Curry came to an end, the Bulldogs’ designated hitter reached base for the 17th consecutive game with a walk in the first inning. … Entering the game with two stolen bases on the season, Georgia’s Tucker Maxwell stole two bases in the sixth inning alone..