Mississippi State (40-13, 20-10) swept Alabama last week and will be the No. 3 seed in the SEC Baseball Tournament that begins this Tuesday in Hoover, Alabama. The Bulldogs will play the winner of Kentucky-Florida on Wednesday morning. Ole Miss (38-17, 18-12) won two of three at Georgia and will be the No. 5 seed in the tournament. The Rebels will play Auburn in the late game on Tuesday night. Arkansas won the regular season title as it swept Florida this weekend. It was the Razorbacks’ first overall SEC championship since 2004. Arkansas, the nation’s unanimous top-ranked team, won all ten of its SEC series this spring. Tennessee won the Eastern Division and will be the No. 2 seed, while Vanderbilt finished as the No. 4 seed. Only Missouri and Texas A&M did not make the tournament field. Mississippi State last won the tournament in 2012, while Ole Miss won in 2018.
The Conference USA baseball tournament will be played outside Mississippi for the first time since 2013. Louisiana Tech will host this year’s tournament. Southern Mississippi (35-17) is the No. 3 seed and will play Western Kentucky on Wednesday. USM has won the last two tourneys and three of the last four.
Baseball News
Jackson State (34-9) fell to Southern University (20-28) in the SWAC baseball championship game, 7-6. JSU won its first three tourney games but will have to wait until May 31 to see if it will receive an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. Alcorn (7-20) won one of three games in the tournament.
William Carey (36-12) lost in the third round as it went 2-2 in the O’Fallon NAIA Regional. Delta State (28-18) fell to West Florida in the Gulf South Championship two games to one. The Statesmen season will continue as they will be the No. 4 seed in the NCAA Division II South Region Tournament in Pensacola that begins on Thursday. The Mississippi College for Women baseball team (21-13) finished third in the USCAA World Series.
The MHSAA will host the baseball championships at Trustmark Park in Pearl the week of June 1-5.
First Mississippian
Madison Central baseball star Spencer Turnbull, who played at Alabama, pitched the first no-hitter by a Mississippian in MLB history. Turnbull, drafted in 2014, hurled his gem for the Detroit Tigers against Seattle last Wednesday.
Jake Mangum was promoted to the N.Y. Mets AA team in Binghamton this week. The former MSU star had three hits in his first two games.
NCAA Softball
Mississippi State softball (35-25) went 2-2 and finished second in the Stillwater Regional. The Ole Miss Lady Rebels’ (36-22) season also came to an end as they finished 2-2 in the Tucson Regional. The SEC had a dozen teams invited to this year’s NCAA softball tournament. Only two SEC teams in South Carolina and Vanderbilt did not receive bids. Belhaven won its first ever NCAA post-season contest, 2-1, over Millikin in Decatur, Illinois, last week. The Blazers finished the season with a 31-12 mark. William Carey lost both its NAIA tournament games last week and ended the season with a 39-9 record.
JUCO News
Former Southern Mississippi basketball player Newton Mealer was named the head coach at Jones College this past week. He has successfully coached at Center Hill High School in north Mississippi for the past dozen years. While at USM, playing for M.K. Turk, he played in two NCAA tournaments and helped the Golden Eagles win the Metro Conference.
Jones College is the No. 2 seed in this week’s Junior College Division II World Series being held in Oxford, Alabama. The Bobcats (43-7) will enter the series on a 21-game winning streak. The Lady Bobcats will play Delaware Tech on Tuesday night. Gulf Coast (33-14), the No. 7 seed, will play Triton also on Tuesday.
Louisiana-Eunice defeated East Central, 7-5, to win the Region 23 JUCO baseball championship.
Dale is a Waynesboro resident who has been writing sports since 1973.
