Mississippi State junior and Co-National Player of the Year Brent Rooker cut through the Pete Taylor Park Magic with three high — almost Major League in style — fly balls late Monday night and into the early hours of Tuesday morning.
All three of his towering fly balls found solid ground, including one long enough to leave the ball park for an opening solo home run in the first inning and another finding grass in shallow right-field to score the game’s tying and go-ahead runs in the eighth.
His fly ball in the eighth was hit so high that three Southern Miss fielders camped under it could not get a good read on the ball for an out.
The Bulldogs shelled out eight other hits to deny the Golden Eagles an appearance in the upcoming super regional at LSU with an 8-6 victory.
Mississippi State, however, does advance and will face the Tigers in its second straight super regional in two years. The program needed two wins against Southern Miss on Monday in the Hattiesburg Regional to advance and got both, including an 8-1 win earlier in the day to force the double-header.
Southern Miss finishes its record-breaking season at 50-16.
“It’s never easy to end it like we ended it today,” said Southern Miss head coach Scott Berry. “Obviously, I want to congratulate Mississippi State with the way they came in and competed with their backs against the wall having to win two games. They competed well.
“What I don’t want to lose in this whole thing is, yes, our season ended today, but what a great season it was for these young men.”
Berry was ejected from the game midway through the eighth inning after an argument with the first base umpire on a call that would have sent the game’s tying run across the plate at the time.
“That’s all part of the game,” Berry said regarding the incident.
Mississippi State added an insurance run in the ninth and held on for the win. The Bulldogs are 12-2 on the year in double-headers.
“What an incredible win for our players tonight,” Mississippi State head coach Andy Cannizaro said. “With everything about this day, and everything about this game tonight, it just summarizes who we are as a team. Just the resiliency, the fight, the grit, the grind, these guys never quit. They never ever quit.”
Monday night’s game featured five home runs. Southern Miss senior Dylan Burdeaux answered Rooker’s home run in the first stanza with a long-ball of his own. Hunter Slater and Leemarcus Boyd also homered for Southern Miss with solo shots in the fourth and fifth inning.
Mississippi State’s second blast of the night came in the top of the fifth, trailing the Golden Eagles 5-1. “Downtown” Cody Brown, as Cannizaro calls him, narrowed the Southern Miss lead by one in the fourth with a three-run home run over the wall in right field.
“I was just trying to put my best swing on the ball,” said Brown. “Try and drive the gap or something like that. … I just got my pitch. I got a changeup out over the middle of the plate and I just hit it as well as I could.”
Southern Miss sophomore Nick Sandlin took the loss on the mound, giving up four runs on four hits in three and two thirds. Spencer Price earned the win for Mississippi State in three innings of work.
