The Rebels, They’re Hot: Ole Miss baseball wins fourth in a row with another offensive barrage
The Rebels have gotten hot again.
OK, so the 2024 Ole Miss baseball team has quite a ways to go yet before it comes anywhere close to recreating the historic run of its 2022 counterpart.
The Rebels, that year, won their first-ever national championship, despite being the very last team named to the NCAA Tournament. Then-captain Tim Elko — who now has a statue in his honor at Swayze Field — issued the warning.
But the tournament field didn’t listen. Ole Miss won 10 of its 11 postseason games.
Still, these Rebels have picked themselves up after an uninspiring, up-and-down start and won four games in a row. Their latest, a 12-3 whipping of Missouri State Wednesday night, improved their overall record to 6-4.
Ole Miss swept its two midweek games. The Rebels have scored 61 total runs over the streak, their largest four-game total since 2008 (66). They easily dispatched of Little Rock, 12-6, on Tuesday.
Ole Miss next hosts No. 18 Iowa for a three-game set this weekend. First pitch Friday (March 1) is set for 6:30 p.m. CT on SEC Network+, which will carry the entire series.
HOW IT HAPPENED
Mercer transfer Treyson Hughes has been slow out of the 2024 gates. However, he showed serious signs of life against Missouri State.
Hughes led the way for the Rebels offensively, finishing with three hits in his five at-bats. He drove in two and scored a run.
Freshman infielder Brayden Randle made his second-career start and was 2 for 4 with three runs scored and a walk. Red-hot slugger Jackson Ross, a transfer from FAU, extended his hitting streak to six games. He was 1 for 4 with two RBI and two runs.
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Six Rebel pitchers combined to surrender zero earned runs out of the Ole Miss bullpen. Freshman lefty Austin Simmons picked up his first career win in going two innings and allowing just one hit. He struck out three. Simmons plays both football and baseball at Ole Miss. He’s a quarterback for Lane Kiffin’s gridiron Rebels.
Josh Mallitz, Mason Nichols and Liam Doyle all worked an inning. Mallitz, a senior in his return season from Tommy John surgery, and Doyle, an off-season transfer addition from Coastal Carolina, each struck out two. Nichols, a sophomore, punched out three.
Ole Miss trailed, 2-0, after two complete.
However, the Rebels applied pressure in loading the bases in the third and without the benefit of a hit. Ole Miss instead walked twice and took a hit-by-pitch to set the table for Ross.
Ross doubled in Randle, as well as senior center field Ethan Groff, with a shot down the left-field line. Senior Ethan Lege brought in two more with his own double, and Ole Miss was up, 4-2. The teams traded unearned runs in the fourth inning before the Rebels got some separation (7-3) with two runs in the seventh. They put the game away with five runs on just three hits in the eighth.
Randle tripled to lead off the inning and scored on a single by Groff. A bases-loaded wild pitch brought in Groff. Missouri State committed an error to keep the inning alive for Hughes. Hughes made the Bears pay with a two-run-scoring base hit. Doyle closed out the win with a perfect ninth.
WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE
The included highlights were provided by Ole Miss Athletics.
