STARKVILLE – The 2026 season got underway with a Mississippi State sweep at Dudy Noble Field this weekend, though it wasn’t always a walk in the park for the Bulldogs.

The debut weekend for new head coach Brian O’Connor, and indeed much of the team, started and finished with nervy games that went into the ninth inning with pressure on MSU to close out. A record opening day crowd of 12,824 witnessed a 6-5 Friday win, followed by a Saturday doubleheader of 6-1 and 7-5 wins, coming down to a pair of strikeouts from closer Maddox Webb to finish the job and keep the team perfect to start the season.

O’Connor admitted that some blowout wins would be nice every once in a while, but his postgame press conference gave the impression that he was eager to see his team experience some pressure right out of the gate.

“You play to win anytime you’re on that field, and I’ve stressed to the players so often that learning to win in the game is critically important,” he said. “That’s paramount, and we’re going to line up with the guys every day that we believe gives us the best chance to win. But there’s also lessons that happen.”

In both Game One and Game Three of the series, the Bulldogs had to come from behind. Despite a slow start with just three hits on Friday, the team showed discipline at the plate when under pressure, found multiple opportunities to score with two outs and found a way to win.

“Hitting is contagious,” All-American third baseman Ace Reese said. His three-run home run was the first long shot of the season for MSU, and helped the Bulldogs flip the game after going down 3-0 early in Game Three on Saturday.

“I know the guys we’ve got in the lineup can hit. I want to give kudos to Hofstra; they played a really good game. That team could be in a regional here in four months. I think we did good on offense, could have done better, but I’m not mad about it. I think the bats aregoing to get going better next weekend.”

O’Connor looked at certain key moments where the team stood up, noting the good performances out of the bullpen to stop scoring runs and post some zeros under pressure. He also noted moments where the wrong decision or an error was made. Rather than simply calling players out, he recognizes the importance of getting jitters out of the way and getting his squad used to playing under the lights early in the campaign.

“Ryder Woodson gets thrown out at third base on that RBI base hit; that can’t happen,” he said, examining Game Three. “Last night in the ninth inning, Aidan Teal and that base hit to left center, throwing the ball to third base, the ball’s got to go to second and keep the double play in order. Those are things that have happened over the last five yweeks and you instruct them and teach them, and then the lights come on and the moments happen, and sometimes they try to do too much. I’ll never fault a young man for trying too hard. Certainly, we’ve got a lot of things we can learn from this weekend and grow from as a team, and fortunate that we found a way to win two games today and three on the weekend.”

In the final game on Saturday, the Bulldogs put six pitchers to work as the team worked to hold on in a back and forth game. Hofstra led twice through 4.5 innings, and had more opportunities to strike, but Jack Gleason, William Kirk and Webb finished the job over the final four frames to keep MSU in the lead.

The experience of throwing under pressure, particularly for players new to The Dude, was invaluable in O’Connor’s eyes, and a preview of plenty more tests to come. It’s the nature of playing MSU baseball, or playing against any SEC team. As the head coach said before the season, there’s no running away now, they’re running toward.

“There’s a big difference in pitching when the game is close and pitching with a seven or eight-run lead,” O’Connor said. “Those butterflies get going, the excitement gets going, and you all know this league. There’s going to be a lot of games like that, so they need to get used to it and understand how to manage those innings when the game is tight.”

The Bulldogs will be back in action at The Dude against Troy on Tuesday at 4 p.m., followed by a Wednesday outing against Alcorn State. The next weekend series against Delaware will begin on Friday at 4 p.m.