OXFORD, Miss. — The weekend started with promise. It ended with a trainer’s report and a series loss.
Ole Miss dropped two of three to No. 5 Georgia at Swayze Field, capping a frustrating stretch that saw the Rebels squander a golden opportunity while playing shorthanded through the final game.
A 5-1 defeat Sunday in the series finale left a bad taste in a weekend that felt winnable — until it wasn’t.
“It was a tough weekend with all the games back-to-back like that, but this league is a tough league and we played three really close games against a good team and come up short in two of them,” starter Taylor Rabe said. “But I think you can’t get too discouraged by that result. Obviously we have things we need to do better and clean those up and then a quick turnaround.”
The Rebs fell to 31-14 overall and 11-10 in SEC play. Georgia improved to 15-6 in conference games.
The Injuries That Unraveled Everything
Before Sunday’s first pitch was thrown, the damage was already done.
Hayden Federico, Ole Miss’ best everyday outfielder and the team’s leader in batting average during conference play, strained his quadricep Saturday and couldn’t start the finale.
Austin Fawley, widely considered one of the SEC’s premier catchers, took a ball off his knee Saturday and exited the second game in the sixth inning.
By Sunday morning the bruise had swollen so badly he couldn’t crouch behind the plate.
Rebs coach Mike Bianco didn’t sugarcoat either situation.
“He just couldn’t get in his stance, and it was awkward,” Bianco said of Fawley. “We decided to DH him, but we’ll say day-to-day for both of those guys.”
Federico did appear as a pinch hitter in the seventh inning, grounding sharply to the second baseman — but he couldn’t push off and run down the line on what became a routine out.
“He could swing, but if he got on base, we’d run for him immediately,” Bianco said.
Lineup That Couldn’t Cover the Gaps
With Fawley shifted to designated hitter, Collin Reuter drew the start behind the plate.
Bianco noted that Fawley’s absence contributed to two pitches getting past the catcher — the kind of thing that doesn’t happen when one of the SEC’s best receivers is back there.
Reuter’s bat doesn’t make up for it. He’s hitting .109 in SEC play — 6-for-55 — with 32 strikeouts and a .448 OPS in conference games. The alternative, freshman Kelven Perera, has two hits in 10 at-bats this season and is 0-for-2 in league play.
To fill Federico’s spot in the outfield, Bianco moved third baseman Judd Utermark to center field. It worked until it didn’t.
In the ninth inning Utermark failed to track down a lazy fly ball, committing the Rebels’ only error of the weekend and opening the door to two unearned Georgia runs that turned a manageable deficit into a finished ballgame.
Aoki Made the Rebs Pay Twice
The offensive struggles were hard enough to stomach on their own. What made them worse was who delivered them.
Georgia starter Caden Aoki had gone just 1.2 innings Saturday, giving up four runs on three home runs to Rebel bats.
He wasn’t even scheduled to pitch Sunday — Dylan Vigue was the planned starter before a late injury scratch forced Georgia to pivot.
Aoki was the pivot and he made Ole Miss look nothing like the team that tattooed him the day before.
He went six innings, allowed one run on four hits and struck out seven.
Bianco knew exactly what changed.
“Breaking ball. Two different breaking balls,” he said. “One with a little more depth. Much like (Paul) Farley last night we just really struggled. I think that’s why when they scratched Vigue they went to (Aoki), a guy that’s already pitched. Somebody with a deep breaking ball and just all day long we either couldn’t touch it or swung over it. He was really good.”
The Rebels’ top six hitters went 4-for-20 with no RBI. Tristan Bissetta and Owen Paino each went 2-for-4. Bissetta’s two hits snapped an 0-for-14 slide across Saturday’s doubleheader.
Brayden Randle had the only other hit. Ole Miss managed just five hits over the final 14 innings of the series — two of them infield singles.
Rabe Gave the Rebs a Chance
It wasn’t all bleak. Rabe was sharp in a spot where the Rebels needed him to be.
He went six innings against Aoki in a pitcher’s duel, struck out six, walked nobody and allowed three earned runs on nine hits. It was a notable turnaround after a rough outing at Tennessee the week before.
A film session with pitching coach Joel Mangrum on Tuesday and a bullpen session Thursday led to some arm slot adjustments and Sunday’s results showed it was worth the work.
Dom Decker scored the game’s lone run in the early innings, coming home from third after Utermark grounded into a double play. Georgia answered to go up 2-1 and never gave it back.
Walker Hooks entered in relief and held the deficit at 3-1 into the ninth before the Utermark error let two unearned runs in. The inning before, Ole Miss had the bases loaded and couldn’t put a ball in play.
The Weekend That Could Have Been
The series loss stings partly because of how the weekend began.
The Rebs won game one of Saturday’s doubleheader by scoring 10 unanswered runs, which felt like a launching pad. Instead Saturday’s 14-inning nightcap drained the momentum and the healthy bodies.
The Rebels had won three straight SEC series before this one. Sunday ended that streak.
Bianco also confirmed that pitcher Marko Sipila underwent Tommy John surgery Tuesday.
The San Diego State transfer appeared in just six innings this season before going down.
What’s Next
There’s no time to dwell on it.
Ole Miss heads to Pearl on Tuesday to face Mississippi State in the Governor’s Cup with first pitch at 6 p.m. before traveling to Fayetteville for a three-game SEC series against Arkansas the following weekend.
