There will be postseason softball played in Oxford. Ole Miss (37-17) is a No. 11 national seed heading into the NCAA Tournament and will host a regional beginning Friday. The Oxford Regional will feature the Rebels, Louisiana-Lafayette (50-4), Southeast Missouri State (45-16) and Chattanooga (37-15). This marks the fourth consecutive year Ole Miss has qualified for the NCAA Tournament and the second time in three seasons the rebels have been a top 16 national seed and hosted a regional. The No. 11 overall seed was somewhat of a surprise considering Ole Miss lost five of its last six games. The Rebels overall strength of schedule, record against top RPI teams and strong work inside the rugged Southeastern Conference apparently made the difference. "I was very surprised at 11," admitted Ole Miss head coach Mike Smith. "I thought we would be somewhere around 14, 15 or 16, maybe sneak in at 13, but 11 surprised me. In fact, even being front of Kentucky and Tennessee...They took our body of work and strength of schedule. Our strength of schedule I think was five or six. That was big." Ole Miss will play Chattanooga at a time to be announced on Friday, with Louisiana-Lafayette and Southeast Missouri meeting in the other first-round game. Chattanooga earned an automatic berth by virtue of winning the Southern Conference Tournament. Louisiana-Lafayette is the Sun Belt Conference champion, while Southeast Missouri won the Ohio Valley Conference title. TICKET INFO TICKETING INFORMATION All-Session books are on sale NOW. All reserved seats will be allocated based on Red priority points and Rebel Reward softball points. Timeline: Sunday, May 12 - Online sales begin at OleMissTix.com Monday, May 13 at 5 p.m. - Priority deadline for reserved seats Thursday, May 16 at 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. - Tickets and parking passes available for pick up at Tad Smith Coliseum Ticket Office Thursday, May 16 at 5 p.m. - General Admission single game tickets available at OleMissTix.com, if available Friday, May 17 at 8 a.m. until mid-4th inning of second game - tickets and parking available for pick up at Tad Smith Coliseum Pricing: NCAA Regional Books: Reserved - $45 General Admission - $30 Students - $20 Parking: Regional parking passes are $30 each. Limited parking passes will be available for sale and orders will be allocated based on Blue priority points. Reserved parking: Ole Miss Soccer Lot Gillom Athletic Performance Center Tuohy Basketball Center First come, first served public parking will be available at all non-reserved lots. Sunday night's announcement ended some tense speculation for the Rebels. "My message (to the team) was that I think our body of work has proven that we deserve a seed. But I said, you just don't know. When you finish the year the way we did...we got swept in Georgia...even though we beat State...we didn't play real well against Kentucky in the SEC Tournament. I think we were 5-5 in the last 10 games. Sometimes it's what the committee sees last. Kudos goes out to the committee, and not just for us, but I think they did a really good job of across the board." Smith was not surprised by the field of teams coming to Oxford. "I figured, if we got a national seed, we'd have ULL, and I figured we'd have Southeast Missouri. Those were the team that I thought we'd get. We've got a tough region," he related. "Southeast Missouri has really good pitching and they have some good bats. (Louisiana) Lafayette can swing it a little bit...It's going to be a good regional," said Smith. The Oxford Regional is paired with the Tucson Regional which features host Arizona (42-12), Auburn (37-19), Colorado State (38-10) and Harvard (25-17). If Ole Miss wins the Oxford regional, and anyone other than Arizona comes out of Tucson, the Rebels would be home for a Super Regional. NCAA SOFTBALL TOURNAMENT Norman Regional – May 17-19 at Norman, Oklahoma No. 1 seed Oklahoma* (49-2) vs. UMBC (30-22) Notre Dame (36-16) vs. Wisconsin (40-12) Evanston Regional – May 17-19 at Evanston, Illinois Southern Ill. (33-13) vs. Louisville (33-21) Detroit Mercy (31-26) vs. No. 16 seed Northwestern* (43-10) Austin Regional – May 17-19 at Austin, Texas No. 9 seed Texas* (41-14) vs. Sam Houston St. (34-21) Texas A&M (28-25) vs. Houston (37-17) Tuscaloosa Regional – May 17-19 at Tuscaloosa, Alabama Arizona St. (33-18) vs. Lipscomb (41-13-1) Alabama St. (24-23) vs. No. 8 seed Alabama* (52-7) Gainesville Regional – May 17-19 at Gainesville, Florida No. 5 seed Florida* (44-15) vs. Boston U. (37-18) Stanford (32-18) vs. Boise St. (34-14) Knoxville Regional – May 17-19 at Knoxville, Tennessee North Carolina (35-18) vs. Ohio St. (34-16) Longwood (37-20) vs. No. 12 seed Tennessee* (39-14) Stillwater Regional – May 16-18 at Stillwater, Oklahoma No. 13 seed Oklahoma St.* (39-14) vs. BYU (29-24) Arkansas (38-18) vs. Tulsa (35-18) Tallahassee Regional – May 17-19 at Tallahassee, Florida South Carolina (36-17) vs. South Fla. (40-17) Bethune-Cookman (26-29) vs. No. 4 seed Florida St.* (51-8) Seattle Regional – May 17-19 at Seattle, Washington No. 3 seed Washington* (45-7) vs. Fordham (29-24) Mississippi State (33-21) vs. Seattle U. (39-15) Lexington Regional – May 17-19 at Lexington, Kentucky Virginia Tech (45-9) vs. Illinois (32-23) Toledo (29-26) vs. No. 14 seed Kentucky* (33-22) Oxford Regional – May 17-19 at Oxford, Mississippi No. 11 seed Ole Miss* (37-17) vs. Chattanooga (37-15) Louisiana (50-4) vs. Southeast Mo. St. (45-16) Tucson Regional – May 17-19 at Tucson, Arizona Auburn (37-19) vs. Colorado St. (38-10) Harvard (25-17) vs. No. 6 seed Arizona* (42-12) Minneapolis Regional – May 17-19 at Minneapolis, Minnesota No. 7 seed Minnesota* (41-12) vs. North Dakota St. (42-14) Georgia (40-17) vs. Drake (42-14) Baton Rouge Regional – May 17-19 at Baton Rouge, Louisiana Texas Tech (39-14) vs. Louisiana Tech (44-14) Monmouth (36-16) vs. No. 10 seed LSU* (40-16) Ann Arbor Regional – May 17-19 at Ann Arbor, Michigan No. 15 seed Michigan* (43-11) vs. Saint Francis (PA) (29-29) James Madison (47-7) vs. DePaul (34-14) Los Angeles Regional – May 17-19 at Los Angeles, California Missouri (32-23) vs. Cal St. Fullerton (38-16) Weber St. (26-19) vs. No. 2 seed UCLA* (46-5)<doc-sep>This softball season just got a little more special as the team earned its highest national seed ever at No. 11. The Rebels face UT-Chattanooga Friday, with Southeast Missouri and THE University of Louisiana filling out the regional in the two and three seeds. It’s a pretty surprising twist given the way the Rebels ended the season. Ole Miss lost 5 of its last 6 games, and even Softball America (which has typically been the most Ole Miss-friendly knowledge source) didn’t have Ole Miss hosting in its final projection. In fact, that projection had the Rebels traveling to Louisiana, which they had as the No. 16 seed. It seems clear the committee saw what happened during the sweep at UGA when the umps called a shocking number of illegal pitches on Brittany Finney on key outs. It doesn’t look like that sweep affected the Rebels’ seeding much at all (if any). #OleMiss softball is hosting a regional in Oxford. An 11 seed, they’ll get under way Friday night. pic.twitter.com/bUpVwLTJdd — Nathanael Gabler (@ngabler4) May 13, 2019 But we’re past that now. It’s time to pay attention to the matchup. UT-Chattanooga has good stats, albeit against bad competition. The Mocs went 37-15 this season in the Southern Conference and sported a .296 batting average and 2.17 team ERA. They’re led by five players hitting over .300 including Amanda Beltran’s 12 home runs. Don’t get me wrong. This team is no slouch. It’s just that they were also swept by UNC-Greensboro. Any team can win one game, so there’s not much use in analyzing this game too much, but suffice it to say if Ole Miss falls to the Mocs, it will be a pretty big letdown. Southeast Missouri hits home runs like it’s going out of style. The Redhawks (SQUAWK EM?) hit 72 home runs this season in the Ohio Valley Conference. As you can imagine, that’s not because of any one specific player. They have four with dingers in the double digits this season. To put this number in perspective, Ole Miss has hit 35 home runs this season... and that’s a lot for the Rebs. On top of the power, they’re also hitting just over .300 as a team, and their team ERA is a respectable 2.60. This is another example of a team that hasn’t been tested too much. It’s tough to know how they’ll show up against Ole Miss. They did split a two game series against Arkansas, so they have the capacity to deal some real damage in this regional. Louisiana lost four games this season. Yeah. Four. The Ragin’ Cajuns are 50-4(!!!) on the year and 25-0 in the SBC. They hit .340 as a team(!) with a 1.37 team ERA(!). Those numbers are absurd, and it’s not as if the teams they played all year were horrific. They were challenged some in out of conference games and really stepped up. Teams like this are a disastrous draw. Sure, in theory Ole Miss should be more talented because of athletic support, etc., but Louisiana isn’t losing games. That’s not really what the Rebels wanted to see in a 2-seed. Playing a Power 5 opponent that was a mixed bag as a 2-seed would probably be easier than this, but at this point in the season, Ole Miss needs to step up to get the win. If they win this thing, the Rebels are likely on to Tuscon, Ariz. for the super regional. Then anything can happen.<doc-sep>OXFORD — When you bat around twice in the first two innings, you generally win more softball games than you lose. No. 11 Ole Miss softball run-ruled fourth-seeded Chattanooga in the first game of the Oxford Regional on Friday, advancing into the winners' bracket with a 12-0 win in five innings. The Rebels advance to face second-seeded University of Louisiana on Saturday with first pitch scheduled for noon. "It's exciting to be able to start the regional off in Game 1 throwing the first punch and continuing to play in the first couple of innings," Ole Miss coach Mike Smith said. "We put the pedal down and kept going and didn't stop. We talked about that in our scouting report. I'm proud of what these girls accomplished today." Right fielder Kaylee Horton paced the Rebels' offense, batting 3-for-3 with a triple, three RBI and three runs scored. Horton's triple cleared the bases in the first inning to break the game open for Ole Miss in an inning where the Rebels sent 12 batters to the plate and scored six runs despite only recording three hits. "Kylan told me that [Chattanooga pitcher Celie Hudson] was throwing back door so I was getting ready for it because me and Kylan have a game plan going on before," Horton explained about her first-pitch triple. "She was throwing first-pitch strikes so we knew how to game plan for it." After the six-run first, Ole Miss tacked on five more runs in the second inning, thanks to RBI singles from Jessica Puk, Amanda Roth and Abbey Latham, as well as an RBI groundout from Kylan Becker. Brittany Finney started in the circle for Ole Miss, throwing three shutout innings with five strikeouts. Finney stranded a runner on third base to end the top of the first inning, and allowed three hits across her three innings. The Rebels turned to Ava Tillmann to finish off the game and Tillmann threw two shutout innings with one strikeout and two hits allowed before the run rule took affect. Neither Finney nor Tillmann walked a batter on Friday. "I feel incredible," Finney said. "As soon as I went out there I was a little nervous. Obviously it's a big tournament. Huge deal. All these games matter. Then I saw my team put up those runs and I absolutely just relaxed." Ole Miss returns to action on Saturday at noon to face Louisiana, which won its first game in the Oxford Regional 3-2 over Southeastern Missouri. The winner of Saturday's game will advance to the championship round, while the loser will have to face the winner of Southeastern Missouri and Chattanooga's Saturday game on Saturday evening. "Hopefully it's not as warm as it was today," Smith said. "You just never know. But we're excited about giving ourselves an opportunity to be at home and to play UL." Contact Nick Suss at 601-408-2674 or nsuss@gannett.com. Follow @nicksuss on Twitter.<doc-sep>
OXFORD — The Ole Miss softball team didn't just survive its first elimination game in the Oxford Regional to set up a Sunday rematch against University of Louisiana. It made a full-team statement in every phase. No. 11 Ole Miss defeated Southeast Missouri 10-0 on Saturday in a run-rule shortened five innings to advance to the championship round of the regional. The Rebels advance to face off against Louisiana at 2 p.m. on Sunday, looking to avenge a 2-0 loss to the Ragin' Cajuns on Saturday afternoon. The Rebels will have to defeat Louisiana twice in order to move on to Super Regionals, while one Ole Miss loss will mean elimination. Ole Miss defeated Southeast Missouri behind the strength of a dominant first inning offensive display. The Rebels sent 13 batters to the plate in the first inning, scoring eight runs on five hits, including a two-run home run from first baseman Abbey Latham, and forced the Redhawks to use three pitchers to get three outs. Latham finished the first inning alone with two hits and three RBI and five other Rebels drove in one run before the inning ended. "I was down in the count and I was kind of fouling balls off and I knew that she wanted to probably come into the zone since she was biting around it a little bit," Latham said about her home run. "Even though I had two strikes on me I still wanted to put a good swing on the ball." "She's humble," Ole Miss coach Mike Smith added. "She crushed that ball. That ball was hit a long way. Quit being humble. That ball was high as well as it was far. She got all of it." After the first inning, Ole Miss' offense slowed down, only adding two more runs off a fourth-inning home run from third baseman Amanda Roth. But from that point, Ole Miss' pitching took over. Starting pitcher Brittany Finney threw three shutout innings, striking out five batters with no walks while allowing just two hits. Right-hander Ava Tillman relieved Finney beginning in the fourth inning, throwing two shutout, hitless innings to close out the game. Over Ole Miss' three games in the Oxford Regional, Rebels pitchers have combined to allow one earned run in 17 innings pitched for an ERA of 0.53. Between Finney, Tillman and Molly Jacobsen, Ole Miss pitchers have combined to strike out 22 batters with no walks and have only allowed 10 hits. "The pitching has been outstanding," Smith said. "It really has. They've given us an opportunity to win each ballgame." The win was Ole Miss' second run-rule victory of the Oxford Regional, following after the Rebels defeated Chattanooga 12-0 on Friday night. Ole Miss will return to action on Sunday to face off against Louisiana. Counting their win over the Rebels on Saturday, the Ragin' Cajuns have won 29 straight games, a streak that dates back to their last loss on March 20. If Ole Miss defeats Louisiana in the 2 p.m. game Sunday, that will force a third contest between the two teams with a spot in Super Regionals at stake. A Louisiana win would eliminate Ole Miss from the NCAA Tournament. Contact Nick Suss at 601-408-2674 or nsuss@gannett.com. Follow @nicksuss on Twitter.