Ole Miss first baseman Will Furniss hits a fly ball in the first half of a double-header against Texas A&M at Swayze Field. | Ole Miss Athletics
Ole Miss first baseman Will Furniss hits a fly ball in the first half of a double-header against Texas A&M at Swayze Field. | Ole Miss Athletics

Texas A&M Overpowers Ole Miss, Forces Winner-Take-All Series Finale

BY Taylor Hodges

Some days you just run into a team so hot it doesn’t need electricity to power its buzz saw.

Saturday afternoon at Swayze Field, that was No. 9 Texas A&M.

The Aggies bats were on fire, smashing seven home runs and forcing No. 20 Ole Miss to use five pitchers in a run-rule shortened 18-5 game.

The bright side for the Rebels, if there is one, is it doesn’t have to wait long to try again. In fact, they only have to wait 60 minutes.

Ole Miss and Texas A&M will play the series’ rubber match as back half of a double-header. That also adds some importance to how many Ole Miss relievers were used. Texas A&M, meanwhile, used just two relief pitchers.

Cade Townsend had an uncharacteristically poor outing. He didn’t make it out of the fourth inning and gave up few no-doubt home runs. But that success could be attributed more to the Aggies just swinging big bats. He did register four strikeouts and gave up just one walk.

Further compounding the problem was that the Rebels relievers didn’t come in and cool off those bats. Landon Waters recorded just two outs and gave up four runs, Landon Koenig gave up three runs on two hits and two walks, Leo Odom recorded just one out and gave up three runs and Owen Kelly ended with the best stat line, one solo home run and two strikeouts.

On the other side, the Rebels’ bats weren’t terrible. They posted a .300 team batting average, .364 with two outs, .316 with runners on base, 4-for-12 with RISP and 1-for-1 with a runner on third and less than two outs.

They also only struck out nine times, which is low for Ole Miss. There just wasn’t any long balls and the offense couldn’t keep up with a red-hot Texas A&M.

But fortunes can change quickly in a double-header and Ole Miss still has a chance to win its final home series of the season.

Pitching Decisions

  • WP: Gavin Lyons (9-0), 2 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 1 K, 46 TP
  • LP: Cade Townsend (5-2), 3.1 IP, 5 H, 7 R, 6 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, 4 HR, 65 TP

Ole Miss Batting Leaders

  • Dom Decker: 2-4, 1 RBI, 1 K
  • Judd Utermark: 2-3, 1 R, 3 RBI, 2 2B, 1 BB
  • Hayden Federico: 1-3, 1 RBI
  • Daniel Pacella: 1-2, 2 R, 1 2B, 1 HBP

Next Up

Due to inclement weather in Sunday’s forecast, the series finale between Ole Miss and Texas A&M was moved up to Saturday.

First-pitch is set for approximately 6:08 p.m.

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