No. 7 Ole Miss baseball drops back-and-forth bout with No. 18 Southern Mississippi
Staff and Wire Report | Ole Miss took the lead twice but couldn’t make it stick either time against Southern Miss on Tuesday, dropping the midweek matchup 10-7 at Trustmark Park.
Brandon Johnson took the loss, allowing three runs to score on three hits.
With two quick outs recorded in the second inning, Ole Miss (19-9) rallied to take the lead. Kemp Alderman and Reagan Burford drew walks to put two on for Hayden Dunhurst. The Rebel catcher took a big hack on a 2-1 pitch and sent a no-doubt bomb over the right field fence to make it 3-0.
However, in the next half inning the Golden Eagles responded. After successive RBI knocks cut the lead down to one, a throwing error plated a third run in the frame for USM, deadlocking the score at three apiece.
An RBI double in the fourth gave Southern Miss (20-8) the lead, with the Golden Eagles adding runs in the fifth and sevenths to widen the gap to 6-3.
The Rebs had a rally of their own in store, though. A Burford single was sandwiched by walks by Alderman and Dunhurst to fill the bags before Peyton Chatagnier delivered a sacrifice fly to cut the deficit to two. A few pitches later, Jacob Gonzalez shot a line drive into the gap in left-center, bringing around a pair to tie the game.
Standing on third, Gonzalez then feigned toward home and Southern Miss’ Dalton Rogers was called for a balk, giving the Rebels the lead at 7-6.
The lead was short lived, however, as Southern Miss put up a four spot of its own in the eighth, a lead it would not surrender.
“You can’t win baseball games like that. It’s disappointing,” said head coach Mike Bianco. “That was the message (after the game). I’m not used to that and we can’t play like that here. We just don’t give ourselves the shot. We’re supposed to be the team that makes plays and gets off the field. Instead we don’t make plays.”
Ole Miss returns to SEC action over the weekend, hosting Alabama at Swayze Field Friday through Sunday. Friday and Saturday’s games can be streamed on SEC Network +, while Sunday’s ballgame will be televised on the SEC Network. All three games can be heard through the Ole Miss Radio Network.
