STARKVILLE – After giving up an early two-run blast, Mississippi State responded for 12 runs in the first inning of its nonconference midweek game against visiting Nicholls before cruising to a 21-6, seven-inning bounce-back win Tuesday night at Dudy Noble Field.
The No. 11 Bulldogs (37-12, 14-10 SEC) washed away the sour taste of their SEC series loss at Texas over the weekend by racking up 18 hits, six home runs and 20 RBI against the Colonels (25-23, 15-12 SLC) in their last non-conference match of the year.
The team has had its fair share of low moments in important SEC series this season, but they’ve mostly avoided the sting of non-conferences losses. Tuesday’s win put the finishing touches on a 23-2 record in non-SEC play, with those two defeats coming to No. 1 UCLA (8-7) and then-No. 10 Southern Miss (6-7).
Head coach Brian O’Conner said it’s a feat that should stand out on their resume come playoff-seeding time.
“I don’t know for sure how the committee looks at it, but that has to be quite impressive to them,” O’Conner said after the game. “… I think that’s pretty special. I can tell you it’s as special as a team that I’ve coached. To do that in the non-conference is incredibly hard. I don’t know for sure but I can’t imagine that there’s many teams or anybody that has that kind of nonconference record. So, (I’m) extremely proud of that and it speaks to our guys not giving any games away and getting ready to play every night and doing what it takes to win the game in front of them.”
Their latest triumph all got started on the wrong side of a long ball. Nicholls’ Caston Thompson delivered a two-run shot off MSU starting pitcher Chris Billingsley in the top of the first inning to give his team a sudden burst of energy. The Colonels converted the sudden surge of juice into loud cheers and jeers that echoed across a mostly silent Dudy Noble Field. All the Bulldogs could do was wait for their turn at the plate to respond – and they answered loudly.
Blake Bevis hammered an RBI double to get MSU on the board, and an RBI single by Jacob Parker knotted the game at 2-2. Reed Stallman broke the contest open with a two-run double off Nicholls starting pitcher Austin Vargas, and an RBI single by Gehrig Frei kept the momentum going. Ace Reese added a two-run single before Parker capped the inning off with a Grand Slam. In total the Bulldogs produced six hits, 12 RBI and walked seven times in the first inning.
That response was something O’Conner wanted to see, specifically when the Bulldogs’ batters were at the plate in a two-strike hole.
“We got better tonight,” he said. “In the first inning we scored 12 runs. Fourteen times we had two strikes on us and 12 of those 14 times there was a positive outcome. Either a hit, a home run, a double or a walk – all with two strikes on hitters. If you want to be successful in conference series, if you want to be successful in regionals, if you want to be successful in a best of two-out-of-three in a super regional or a national championship series – wearing pitching staffs out with two strikes is vital. … It makes that team go into their bullpen earlier than they wanted to in Game 1 and you get rewarded for that in Game 3. So, we got better tonight.”
From there it was cruise control for the Bulldogs. Stallman and Drew Wyers each hit solo homers in the second inning to grab a 14-2 lead, then Stallman hit his 10th homer of the year for two runs in the third inning. The Colonels managed to break up the Bulldogs’ spree of offense in the top of the fourth with three runs on singles by Jaxson Milam and Logan Terry. Reese provided MSU’s response with a solo homer over the left-field wall in the bottom of the inning, and Sullivan raced home during a wild pitch to put the Bulldogs up 18-5.
Keegan Giger stopped the bleeding for Nicholls once again with an RBI triple, but Reese reopened the wound with his second homer of the night – a three-run shot to right field that sailed out of the park.
Stallman and Reese each led the team with four hits and two homers. Parker had three hits, and Wyers had two.
State moves on to its last home SEC series against No. 6 Auburn, which begins at 7 p.m. Thursday.
It’s an opportunity for the Bulldogs to gain a bit of distance in the conference standings with the SEC Tournament looming. The top four teams earn double byes in the SEC Tournament, and the Tigers (33-14, 14-10) sit just above MSU at the No. 4 spot in the league. Auburn arrives at Dudy Noble Field on a win streak of five straight SEC series, including victories over No. 9 Texas A&M, No. 17 Arkansas, No. 24 Oklahoma and No. 21 Florida.
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