Georgia senior Kolby Branch laced a ball down the third base line with two outs in the fifth inning, and just like that, Mississippi State was playing from behind.
A 7-0 start through four innings for MSU was erased with nine UGA runs across just two innings. Branch’s two-RBI double was the climax of a catastrophic State collapse, and had Foley Field rocking, all the momentum on Georgia’s side.
The barrage of blows had the Bulldogs laying on the canvas. But State, battered and bruised, got up. They punched back.
Junior Kevin Misilewski and graduate Gehrig Frei hit a couple of solo shots, breaking down Georgia’s two-run guard and evening up the dogfight. Georgia’s Rylan Lujo responded, an uppercut that lifted a ball over the left field wall, giving UGA a 10-9 lead.
MSU took the hit, and punched back.
Sophomore Ryder Woodson homered to left center in the top of the seventh to tie it. Junior Ace Reese swung at a 3-0 pitch served on a platter, and before the ball even cleared dead center field, turned to his dugout and banged his chest. A solo shot crushed off the batters eye gave State an 11-10 lead in the top of the eighth. Milewski wore a pitch with the bases loaded, and MSU had a 12-10 lead.
The Bulldogs were on a full offensive outburst, and fought back from a killshot by UGA to take the lead back. It just wasn’t enough.
UGA’s Michael O’Shaughnessy hit a three-run blast, his second home run of the game, which proved to be the knockout blow.
It’s an incredibly tough pill to swallow, the fifth close loss that MSU has taken at the hands of UGA this year. With a 7-0 lead, it looked as if State would soon be one win away from a return to the College World Series. Instead, the Bulldogs face elimination against the nation’s top-remaining seed.
“We just didn’t do enough on the mound executing,” head coach Brian O’Connor said. “They’re a really great team, we’re a really great team, we’ve just come out on the wrong side of it.”
Through the devastation, and the bleak outlook the loss has put in front of MSU, the Bulldogs still have things to build upon for Sunday’s game two.
The offense is the obvious bright spot in the loss. MSU scored 12 runs, with five home runs fueling the offensive outburst. The usual suspects of Reese and Frei were part of it, but a guy like Milewski, who hadn’t been the biggest part of the Bulldog offense all year, stepped in in a big way.
Milewski went 3-4 with two home runs and three RBIs. The whole lineup ate, with six players recording an RBI and eight recording a hit. State’s offense has been potent in the NCAA Tournament, and it’s a performance State will have to carry to Sunday.
But the most important part of State’s offensive outburst is how it fought back.
Blowing a seven-run lead in the super regional round is a fate that would kill many lineups. It would have been unsurprising if the Bulldogs never responded and shut down. Instead, MSU went blow-for-blow with one of the nation’s top offenses.
Moral victories always taste bitter, but, whether you believe in them or not, State’s fight is a moral victory it can take into Sunday.
O’Connor said he believes in his guys to come out on Sunday believing it will be the day they finally get over the UGA hump.
“We’re just going to take it one pitch at a time,” Milewski said of how MSU will approach Sunday’s game. “(We’ll) just go out there and keep playing our game.”
Jake is the Mississippi State athletics reporter for The Dispatch.
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