STARKVILLE — Mississippi State senior shortstop Kayla Winkfield and assistant coach Samantha Ricketts had a brief but beneficial meeting Sunday night.
With MSU and Ole Miss locked in a scoreless extra-innings battle at Nusz Park, Ricketts summoned Winkfield.
“She said, ‘Find a way to get on, the people will behind you will do the rest,’ ” Winkfield said. “I cleared my mind and forgot about the first seven innings. My whole focus was to get on base. Sure enough, after that, everybody else did the rest.”
Winkfield led off the eighth with her second hit. Caroline Seitz followed with a sacrifice bunt. After an intentional walk to Katie Anne Bailey, Amanda Ivy followed with a game-winning line-drive single to left field to give MSU a 1-0 victory against Ole Miss 1-0 before a nationally-television audience and a Nusz Park crowd of 1,292.
“What an exciting game,” said Ivy, a junior center fielder. “We really needed a win. Nobody has been down. We have just stayed true to the process. We know we are in a good team. Everybody has some slumps. We have just been fighting.”
The victory helped MSU (21-14, 2-6 Southeastern Conference) snap a six-game losing streak and even the three-game SEC series at a game apiece in the first extra-inning game at Nusz Park. Ole Miss fell to 27-10 and 3-5. The teams will play again at 6 tonight (SEC Network).
The Bulldogs won in dramatic fashion less than 24 hours after the Rebels won 4-3 on a three-run home run in the sixth inning Saturday night.
“I thought we really had a great effort Saturday night (in the loss),” MSU coach Vann Stuedeman said. “Tonight, we had a great effort. We played with a little more passion and enthusiasm. We didn’t play like a team that had been struggling. We played like a team that wanted to win a rivalry game badly.
“The third game now is huge. We need to find a way to win the series. Winning series is so difficult do in this league. We have to find a way to play with this same passion and win another game.”
Despite snapping its skid, MSU’s offensive struggles are alarming. It entered the series last in the league in hitting and runs scored. Despite a victory, one run on four hits won’t do much to help those figures.
“We are having some offensive issues,” Stuedeman said. “I am proud we gutted it out and found a way to win. Sometimes, one or two players struggle and it turns into several players struggling. I feel confidence about our approach at the plate. We have several veteran players who have shown they can produce in this league.
“Sometimes you can try to do too much. That is what we have been stressing. Control what you can control. You can’t try to turn everything around on one at-bat, so it’s all about patience and believing in yourself.”
Junior Alexis Silkwood (1-4) threw 92 pitches and allowed six hits. She walked none and struck out five. She has been building her workload so she will be prepared to shoulder the responsibility of being the team’s ace down the stretch.
“You saw vintage Silk out there tonight,” Winkfield said. “She is a fighter and competitor. She is going to give you 110 percent every time she steps in the circle. All we have to do is make plays behind her. When she is pitching like that, the whole team has a different confidence level.”
Ivy said the team believes it should win every time Silkwood throws.
On this night, making the winner’s circle took some help. Ole Miss had a pair of critical baserunning mistakes that ended two innings.
The Bulldogs had few scoring options other than squandering a double by Wakefield in the third.
“The crowd really helped get us the victory,” Stuedeman said. “We have been down as a team. It takes a lot of passion to win any game in this league. Our dugout provided that. All 22 players provided that. Our fans provided that, too. They were huge in helping us get the outcome we wanted.”
Follow Dispatch sports writer Scott Walters on Twitter @dispatchscott
Scott was sports editor for The Dispatch.
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