OMAHA, Neb. — Will Bednar calmly fielded a fourth-inning comebacker, jogged toward first base and flipped the baseball into the glove of teammate Luke Hancock.

One out later, he sprinted off the field and into Mississippi State’s dugout to rub it in his coach’s face.

Bednar had been getting a hard time from Chris Lemonis since flubbing a similar play in NCAA Regionals, and even in Wednesday’s winner-take-all Game 3 of the College World Series final against Vanderbilt, the sophomore right-hander didn’t miss an opportunity to enjoy the moment and give his coach a little payback.

Then he went back on the mound and pitched two more hitless innings.

Starting Wednesday on just three days’ rest, Bednar was his dominant — and happy-go-lucky — self as he led the Bulldogs to a 9-0 win over the Commodores, clinching his school’s first-ever national championship.

“Mississippi State baseball fans deserve it,” Bednar said. “We have the greatest fans in the world, and they’ve been supporting us from Day 1. It’s awesome to be able to deliver that to them.”

The righty pitched six innings without giving up a hit, marking his third consecutive strong start in an Omaha outing for the ages. Bednar struck out 15 Texas hitters over six innings April 20 and delivered a quality start Saturday against the Longhorns.

But on short rest, he faltered in the first inning Wednesday. He went to 3-2 counts on Javier Vaz and Dominic Keegan, walking both. Parker Noland also saw a full count, then fouled off two pitches.

In the dugout, Lemonis and pitching coach Scott Foxhall looked on, unsure how long the ace of the Bulldogs’ rotation could go.

“We were just trying to feel him out,” Lemonis said.

Then Noland hit into a 6-4-3 double play. The spell was seemingly broken. After just a leadoff walk in the second, Bednar retired the next 15 batters in what Lemonis called a “pretty amazing” performance.

“He got stronger and stronger, and the innings got shorter and shorter in the middle of the game,” the coach said.
Bednar said he treated the outing like any other game, trusting his defense to make plays behind him and rolling quickly through inning after inning. He threw seven pitches in the third, 10 in the fifth and 10 in the sixth.

But when the Bulldogs put up a four-spot to break the game open in a lengthy top of the seventh, Bednar — at an even 90 pitches — was done for the night.

“We had the big inning, and it just got too long,” Lemonis said. “ … We had a fresh Landon Sims with a nine-run lead and nine outs to go, so making the smart move there is probably the smart thing to do.”

Lemonis said he expected to have to “rip the ball out of (Bednar’s) hand,” but the competitive sophomore understood. He watched Sims record the final nine outs, losing Bednar’s no-hitter but keeping intact what really mattered.

“I’m sure I’ll probably bust his chops tomorrow,” Bednar said, “but we won the national championship. I don’t really care all that much. I really couldn’t care less about that right now; I’m on cloud nine.”

The Pennsylvania native upped his MLB draft stock significantly over the past two weeks, entering Omaha as a late first-round pick if not a second-round selection and leaving as at least a mid-first-rounder. For Sims, who called Bednar “the greatest competitor I’ve ever played with,” seeing his teammate find professional success will be the fitting culmination to a great Mississippi State career.

“I couldn’t be happier for him with what he’s done and the success he’s put up in his short time here,” he said. “Whoever ends up drafting him is going to get a Bulldog.”

Theo DeRosa reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @Theo_DeRosa.