It was only a few weeks ago that we were in panic mode on this here web site. Ole Miss had just lost two-of-three to horrible, terrible, no-good Kentucky at home and were on the brink of potentially falling into the three-seed conversation. Fast forward to today and now the No. 11 Rebels (32-17, 15-9) are tied for second in the SEC West and are projected to host their own regional, per D1Baseball. Now, all they have to do is take care of No. 5 Mississippi State (39-10, 15-9) when they arrive at Swayze Field for a three-game series to possibly settle who is the No. 2 team coming out of the West division. But, it won’t be easy because the Bulldogs are arguably one of the most complete teams in the country. Offensively they’re led by PhD student Jake Mangum who is in his ninth year in Starkville. He leads the team with a .404 average and recently broke the record for most hits ever in the conference. Justin Foscue leads them with 13 home runs and they have four other every day players with 40 or more RBI’s. On the mound, they’re just as dangerous. Golden Spikes Award finalist Ethan Small gets things started on Friday. He sports a 1.85 earned run average and a ridiculous 122 strikeouts in just 73 innings pitched. After him is freshman sensation J.T. Ginn who leads the team with eight wins and also has phenomenal strikeouts numbers (82 strikeouts in 64.1 innings). Needless to say, the Rebs will need to get off to a hot start and chase Small and Ginn to get to the Dawgs bullpen which hasn’t been as impressive as their starters. If that can happen, the Rebs have the offense (.294 SEC team average) and the bullpen to hold off State in an effort to win their ninth series of the season. With all that said, the weather is supposed to be very, very bad starting Friday night. Per Weather dot com, the precipitation chances reach as high as 90 percent on Friday and fail to drop below 80 percent the next day. So, odds are the Rebs and Bulldogs will need to get a game in on Friday and will be staring a double header in the face on Sunday. Hooray. How to watch TV: ESPN2 (Sunday) Online: WatchESPN Audio: TuneIn Friday: 8:30 p.m. CT Saturday: 6 p.m. CT Sunday: 12 p.m. CT 3 things to look for this weekend Can Doug Nikhazy do it again? The true freshman has been dynamite this season. Last week, he threw 6.1 innings, scattered five hits, and allowed just one run in a win against LSU in Baton Rouge, helping the Rebs win their first series there in 37 years. Now, he will be tasked with shutting down one of the best teams in the country. He has a 2.98 ERA in conference play and teams are hitting just .229 against him. His tenacity and ability to wiggle out of tough scenarios has been there all season long and it will be needed this weekend as well against Chris Lemonis’ top-five squad. Nikhazy’s ability to work ahead of hitters, throw inside, and use his off-speed stuff to keep them guessing will be a key cog to his success in game two. Will Ole Miss ever make it easy? Last weekend in game three, Ole Miss led LSU 7-0 after three innings, 10-4 after five innings, and took a 15-9 lead into the bottom of the ninth. Then, they preceded to give up six runs with two outs and had to win in the 10th, sparing me and many others an aneurism. Could it have been nerves getting to Ole Miss in the time when they were trying to win a series for the first time since 1982 or could it be aLeX bOx MaGiC?!?! Either way it was intoxicating to watch it unfold and don’t want to go through it again while playing the maroon and white team. Is God not wanting Ole Miss to play baseball this year? You tell me.<doc-sep>OXFORD — It's never fair to reduce nine innings of baseball to the outcomes of two at-bats. But for Ole Miss on Friday, doing so might just be valid. Ole Miss squandered plenty of opportunities in its 2-0 loss against Mississippi State on Friday night. Base running was certainly a concern, as the Rebels had three runners called out on the base paths, twice to end an inning. Finishing innings proved more difficult on the other side, as both of Mississippi State's runs came off two-out RBI. And the Rebels stranded runners on first and second after putting two men on with one out in the fourth inning, striking out in back-to-back at-bats to end the threat. But despite all this, despite a performance where Ole Miss only scratched six hits across and was shut out for the first time this season, the Rebels brought the winning run to the plate with no outs in the bottom of the eighth inning. By all accounts, Ole Miss was in position to take the lead, or at the very least make the game interesting. But it didn't work out. Two leadoff singles turned into a strikeout on a fouled-off bunt for a third strike and a 4-6-3 double play off the bat of a pinch hitter. Two on, no out turned into three outs, no runs in a span of five pitches. Why? Ole Miss coach Mike Bianco put the answer simply. "We had a couple opportunities and we didn't cash in," Bianco said postgame. "We had two punch outs and a double play ball." As for why the exchange went the way it did, Bianco was able to explain further. After designated hitter Cole Zabowski and first baseman Kevin Graham led off the eighth inning with a pair of singles against Mississippi State's best reliever Jared Liebelt, the Rebels had freshman second baseman Justin Bench due up. Bench, who was 0-for-2 with two strikeouts prior to the at-bat, played on Friday for the first time since March 5 after missing the previous two months with a broken hand. Initially, Bianco sent senior Jacob Adams out to pinch hit for Bench, as the plan was to bat left-handers Adams and Chase Cockrell against the right-handed Liebelt. But Bianco re-inserted Bench back into the batter's box for what Bianco described as a "bunt situation." But Bench wasn't able to get the bunt down. He was called for a strike looking on the first pitch of the at-bat and fouled off the next pitch attempting to bunt for strike two. The bunt remained on for the remainder of the at-bat and he fouled off the fourth pitch as well, resulting in a strikeout for out number one. After Bench, fellow freshman Josh Hall was due up. Like Bench, Hall was 0-for-2 with two strikeouts on the day. So Bianco opted for the more veteran Adams to pinch hit for Hall and attempt to turn the lineup back over to leadoff hitter Anthony Servideo. But Adams dribbled the first pitch he saw to Mississippi State second baseman Justin Foscue to end the inning and Ole Miss' rally. In all, Ole Miss finished Friday night 0-for-4 with runners in scoring position. The four missed opportunities came respectively on a strikeout, a strikeout, a bunting strikeout and a double play grounded into. Mississippi State, by comparison, batted just 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position. That's not necessarily a great mark either. But in a game headlined primarily by pitching, that one hit may well have been the difference. Contact Nick Suss at 601-408-2674 or nsuss@gannett.com. Follow @nicksuss on Twitter.<doc-sep>
OXFORD, Miss. — No. 5 Mississippi State baseball used stellar pitching to beat No. 11 Ole Miss 2-0 in the opening game of a three-game Southeastern Conference series Friday night at Swayze Field. The start of the game was pushed back from a 6:30 p.m. CT start to 8:30 p.m. CT due to a weather delay. There was also a fog delay after the top of the sixth inning, which lasted 32 minutes until 10:56 p.m. MSU (40-10, 16-9 SEC) scored a run in the third and fifth innings, while holding Ole Miss (32-18, 15-10 SEC) to six hits. This is the first time the Rebels have been shut out all season. Redshirt-junior left-hander Ethan Small (7-1) continued his dominance with a stellar five innings of work. He struck out 10 batters, walked one and allowed just three hits to earn the win. Sophomore Tanner Allen accounted for both runs, as he finished with two RBIs on 3-for-4 hitting in the contest. Sophomore Jordan Westburg joined him with a multi-hit performance, as he finished 2-for-3 with one run scored. MSU scored the first run of the game in the top of the third inning when Westburg hit a two-out single to left center and came around to score on an RBI double from Allen to put MSU up 1-0. The Dawgs added a run in the fifth inning to make it 2-0. Junior Gunner Halter led off the inning with a single through the left side. A pair of ground outs then moved him over to third before Allen’s single up the middle plated him. After the 32-minute fog delay, senior Jared Liebelt took the mound. He allowed no runs on three hits and fanned two batters in four innings to earn his fifth save on the year. Junior right-hander Will Ethridge (5-5) was charged with the Ole Miss loss after allowing two runs on six hits in six innings pitched. He struck out four batters and walked two. State and Ole Miss are scheduled to be back in action again Saturday at 6 p.m. CT at Swayze Field. The game will be televised by SEC Network+.