No. 3 Mississippi State Baseball Falls to No. 6 Ole Miss on Saturday

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Jordan extends reached base streak to 18 games, State fans 10 batters for 14th straight contest

STARKVILLE – On a sun-splashed afternoon at Dudy Noble Field, the No. 3 Mississippi State baseball team dropped a 9-0 decision to No. 6 Ole Miss to even the series at one game apiece.

Ole Miss (26-9, 9-5 SEC) put the leadoff runner on base in each of the first five innings and that runner came around to score each time, as the Rebels built an 8-0 lead after five innings. A seventh-inning RBI double accounted for the ninth run of the game as the Rebels snapped Mississippi State’s (26-8, 9-5 SEC) nine-game winning streak.

Rowdey Jordan reached base via a sixth inning walk to push his reached base streak to 18 games and  Brayland Skinner accounted for State’s lone hit of the game 0 a fifth-inning single. The only other base runner in the game was a Kamren James first-inning walk.

Four Mississippi State pitchers combined to allow nine runs on 17 hits and strike out 10 Ole Miss hitters. It is the 14th straight game for MSU with double-digit strikeouts to extend its school-record streak. The Bulldog staff only issued three walks in the contest.

Ole Miss starting pitcher Doug Nikhazy (4-1) collected the win with nine shutout innings and allowed just one hit. He walked two and struck out 12 batters in the complete game. At the plate, five Rebels collected multiple hits, led by a three-hit day from Hayden Dunhurst.

Quotable

Head coach Chris Lemonis

On his message to the team after the game

CL: They’re going to have to respond tomorrow. We felt like a million bucks last night and they were pissed. Now we’re the ones that are pissed. We have to get a good night’s sleep, get back and be ready to go. The sun comes up tomorrow. It’s a new day and we’ve got a chance to win a big ballgame against our rival. It’s going to be a heck of a game tomorrow, but we’ve got to come out and play better. We’ve got to be in every phase of the game.

Scoring Recap

Top First

Jacob Gonzalez led off the game with a walk, moved to second on a ground out and came in to score on a Hayden Dunhurst double down the right field line with two outs.

Ole Miss 1, Mississippi State 0

Top Second 

A leadoff triple for TJ McCants was followed by a one-out double from Cael Baker to plate the second Rebel run of the game.

Ole Miss 2, Mississippi State 0

Top Third 

Kevin Graham led off the inning with a base hit and moved to third on Dunhurst’s single. Justin Bench then grounded into a fielder’s choice to push Graham across.

Ole Miss 3, Mississippi State 0

Top Fourth

Hayden Leatherwood homered to lead off the inning, before a hit batter and base hit ended the outing for Will Bednar with no outs in the inning. A sacrifice fly from Gonzalez plated the second run of the inning before Peyton Chatagnier’s base hit made it 6-0 in favor of the visitors. 

Ole Miss 6, Mississippi State 0

Top Fifth

The first two batters reached base for the third straight inning before a strikeout. Baker followed with an RBI single and pinch hitter Ben Van Cleve doubled to plate the second run of the frame.

Ole Miss 8, Mississippi State 0

Top Seventh

Van Cleve singled to right field before pinch runner Cade Sammons came in to score on Gonzalez’s double to right center.

Ole Miss 9, Mississippi State 0

Up Next

Mississippi State and Ole Miss will wrap up the three-game series at 1 p.m. on Sunday, April 18 at Dudy Noble Field. State will be looking to capture its fourth SEC series of the season and finish off an eighth winning weekend in 2021, along with making it five straight series wins over the Rebels.