Coach Erik Bakich, left, and the Terps lost to Clemson, 7-2, in the final game of their series Saturday. The Tigers won all three games.

Trailing Clemson 1-0 in the fourth inning Friday, it looked as though the Terrapins baseball team was poised to finally break through against Tigers starter Kevin Brady.

After first baseman Tomo Delp led off the inning with a sharp single to right field, K.J. Hockaday, the team’s top hitter in ACC play, stepped to the plate. The third baseman swung and missed at the first pitch and took a ball before lining the third pitch up the middle, a shot that seemed destined to reach center field off the bat.

But Brady instinctively stuck his glove up next to his head, snatching the would-be base hit. Hockaday had barely left the batter’s box. Delp was frozen between first and second. Brady threw to first, doubling off Delp and squashing any thought of a Terps breakout.

The Terps would score again in the series. The Terps would have their rallies. The Terps would keep the Tigers in striking distance with opportunities to win.

But nothing felt the same after that play. Clemson (24-17, 12-9 ACC) took all three games from the Terps this weekend at Bob “Turtle” Smith Stadium.

“It was definitely disappointing,” shortstop Alfredo Rodriguez said. “It’s tough to lose, and it’s tough to lose at home, more or less get swept. … You just got to move on. Our backs are a little bit up against the wall, so we’ll see what kind of team we’re made of. “

The Terps (25-17, 7-14) were in every game of the series. The 5-4 decision on Friday night wasn’t final until the Tigers scored two runs in the ninth and the Terps could respond with only one.

Clemson scored three runs in the first inning off starter Brett Harman in Saturday’s first game, stringing together four hits on two-strike counts, eventually extending its lead in the game to 5-1. The Terps scored two in the sixth and had the bases loaded but couldn’t add more to their total in the Tigers’ eventual 5-3 win.

In the second game Saturday afternoon, hope again surfaced. That, too, was deceiving. After taking a 2-0 lead in the first inning, the Terps saw hit after hit fall for Clemson. The Tigers scored seven unanswered runs to close out the series with a 7-2 win.

“That’s baseball,” coach Erik Bakich said. “All we can try to do is have quality at-bats. We actually did have quite a few. We just didn’t have anything to show for it. Unfortunately, it kind of seemed like that was a pattern for three straight games.”

Even the Terps’ bright spots on the weekend seemed dim as Clemson’s players walked across Shipley Field to their bus as dark storm clouds rolled into College Park.

Games of two, three and four hits gave catcher Jack Cleary a 9-for-12 line on the weekend. Those nine hits, which included one double, bumped his average from .254 to .329 on the season. Entering the weekend, he had 17 hits all year. Yet despite putting the ball in play every time he was up and getting on base nine times, Cleary never scored or recorded an RBI.

“I was just trying to have a quality at-bat, just get up there and see the ball and stay back,” Cleary said. “A couple of them fell for me. I felt good up there. But it’s a tough weekend for us.”

Left-hander Jimmy Reed went at least eight innings for the third straight outing, throwing 115 pitches in 8.1 innings Friday. He allowed three runs (two earned) on eight scattered hits while walking three and striking out five. Keeping the Tigers in striking distance paid off when the Terps scored three runs to tie the game in the bottom of the eighth. Relievers Charlie Haslup and Korey Wacker, however, each allowed a run in the ninth.

“We definitely still have confidence,” Reed said. “Even though we got beat three times, we’re still a good team. We know that.”

The three losses drop the Terps into a tie for 10th place in the conference, two games out of the final playoff spot in the ACC Tournament. It was the first time the Terps had been swept in league play since March 9-11, when they dropped three at Wake Forest.

The window is still there – nine games is plenty of time to make up two games and make the ACC Tournament – but it’s closing. So if the Terps are going to mount a late-season surge to advance to postseason play for the first time in seven years, it will start tomorrow at Towson.

“I know a lot of people are going to say we’re out and this was a knockout blow,” Bakich said. “We’re never out. We’re never knocked out, but we are down and we’ve got to get back up. And we will.”

dgallen@umdbk.com