Mississippi State baseball got back into the winning ways of SEC play over the weekend with a much-needed sweep at South Carolina.
After the No. 17 Bulldogs’ (30-10, 10-8) offense hit a lull in their two previous conference series, they broke through in a big way, outhitting the Gamecocks (19-22, 5-13) 36-23 and getting a few pitching gems from atop the mound during the Friday-Sunday set.
The power bats were rolled out in Game 1 on Friday as the Bulldogs tacked on four home runs in a 5-3 win. Gehrig Frei delivered a solo shot in the first inning and Ace Reese and Reed Stallman added a solo homer and a two-run blast in the second, respectively, for an early 4-0 lead. South Carolina’s Ethan Lizama drilled a three-run shot to put pressure back on MSU, which responded in the ninth inning with a solo homer by Noah Sullivan. Starting hurler Tomas Valincius dominated to the tune of 11 strikeouts and just five hits through his 6 ½ innings of work, before giving way to Ben Davis, who struck out three to close the game. The team racked up 12 hits and five RBI in snapping its six-game skid in the SEC.
“It’s big for us,” head coach Brian O’Connor said after his team took Game 1. “Certainly we weren’t happy with how we played the game and the results the last two weekends in Starkville, but we just continue to talk to the guys about what it takes, how challenging this league is and we just have to be a little better and tougher.”
MSU continued to exorcize some offensive demons and grabbed the series victory on Saturday in a 9-0 shutout. The Bulldogs piled on 14 hits, including a three-run homer by Blake Bevis and a two-run shot by Reese, for nine RBI. Bevis was a late addition to the game’s starting lineup in place of Stallman and played a huge part in helping his team grab their first SEC series win in over two weeks.
“It was a last-minute decision,” Bevis said. “Unfortuanely Reed tweaked a little something today during batting practice, so I found out I was going to be in the lineup pretty much right before the game.”
Duke Stone delivered another stellar display from the mound with 12 strikeouts and only five hits given up in a performance that earned him SEC Co-Pitcher of the Week.
Bevis was back in the lineup for Game 3 and helped MSU complete the sweep Sunday in a much different fashion. Instead of riding the long ball to a blowout, the Bulldogs had to scrap for every run in an 11-inning, 4-3 win. A two-run homer by Bevis gave the team a 2-0 lead in the second inning and he followed that with single in the sixth to score Vytas Valincius. South Carolina got on the board in the bottom of the sixth with an RBI single from Talmadge Lecroy, and the Gamecocks continued their surge in the eighth inning with two more runs to force extra innings.
Vytas got on base with a single and then was replaced by pinch runner Gatlin Sanders. Aiden Teel singled up the middle to send Sanders to third base, and a sacrifice fly by Kevin Milewski sent him home for the sweep. It was a sequence the Bulldogs didn’t have to rely on much to grab wins in the first two games, but O’Connor said it was good to see them execute when the moment called for fundamental baseball.
“You are going to have to manufacture runs on a day like today,” he said. “The first two days we hit some home runs and that was great, but on a day like today you have to play good team baseball. That’s what we did.”
The Bulldogs are back at home this week and hit the diamond at Dudy Noble Field at 6 p.m today against Memphis before getting back into SEC play this weekend against visiting LSU.
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