Florida State rocks Bulldogs into the loser's bracket, 10-3

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Mississippi State knew that Saturday night’s winner’s bracket game in the Tallahassee Regional was going to be a war.

The Diamond Dawg offense was facing off against arguably the best left handed pitcher in the country in Jamie Arnold, but MSU had its own LHP ace in Pico Kohn. Arnold pitched one of his best games of the year while Kohn faltered.

A five-run fourth blew the game open for the Seminoles and the Bulldogs could never solve Arnold in a sound 10-3 loss. Arnold threw a career-high 119 pitches and had 13 strikeouts while walking just two batters in the win.

“They controlled every aspect of the game,” interim head coach Justin Parker said. “One of the best starters in all of college baseball. Tons of lefthanded power and they capitalized on some mistakes. We didn’t control many counts, and they controlled all the counts both sides. That’s basically the outcome of the game.”

While Arnold shoved, Kohn struggled

On the flip side, Kohn struggled in what could be his final game as a Bulldog. The junior lasted just 3.2 innings, gave up six hits, seven runs and four walks while striking out seven batters. That fourth inning would be the dagger for Kohn and the Bulldogs.

After walking the first two batters he saw and giving up three stolen bases, Kohn surrendered an RBI single with one out. The junior loaded the bases with an intentional walk with two outs and paid for it when cleanup hitter Myles Bailey blasted a grand slam to make it 7-1.

“He didn’t have feel for a (changeup) so it kind of boxed him in to being a two-pitch guy,” Parker said. “He didn’t control enough counts, the free bases. I thought he made some big pitches to get him close to getting out of that jam in the fourth he just came up a little short. The home run was the big crippler.”

The Bulldogs never got back in the game from there as Arnold put it on cruise control. Hunter Hines hit a two-run homer in the bottom of the inning to close the lead, but Arnold never really felt any pressure as he dominated State’s lineup.

Although Charlie Foster, Dane Burns and Jacob Pruitt put up four-straight innings without a run, Pruitt would surrender three runs in the ninth to push the lead out to 10-3.

Bulldog pitching was all over the zone in the game with the quartet of hurlers walking a season-high 14 batters. MSU did strikeout 16 guys but FSU made them pay for the free bases with nine hits and three home runs. Two of those long balls came off the bat of Drew Faurot.

At the plate, the Bulldog bats were relatively quiet. MSU had just five hits and two walks while striking out 15 times. Hines had a good day against Arnold as he won the lefty-lefty matchup and had hits in all three at bats with the two RBI on his 16^th home run this season.

Noah Sullivan finished 2-for-4 with a home run and double. It was Sullivan’s second home run of the Regional and the 100^th of the year for the Bulldogs. This year’s State team is the first to hit the century mark on homers.

Bulldogs have backs against the wall

With the loss, State (35-22) has now moved into the loser’s bracket and has work to do to fight out of it. The Bulldogs have a rematch with Northeastern coming their way on Sunday morning as the Huskies came through with their first NCAA win since the 1970s on Saturday with a 4-3 win over Bethune-Cookman.

State knocked off the Huskies on Friday 11-2 but will have to beat them again to stay alive. A victory in that game will have MSU back in a matchup with FSU on Sunday night at 5 p.m. CT. Parker said that Evan Siary will be the starting pitcher for the game against Northeastern.

“It doesn’t change anything,” Hines said of the loss. “We’ve still got to go out there and play our best to win. We’ve got our backs against the wall, and it’s been like that the whole year. We’ve just got to simplify, go out there and play the best that we can.”