Ole Miss shuts out Southern Miss 10-0 in first game of Hattiesburg Super Regional

Ole Miss finds itself in the driver’s seat of the Hattiesburg Super Regional after shutting out Southern Miss 10-0 in the first game of the series on Saturday.

The Rebels win handed Southern Miss its largest loss of the season and its second shutout of the year.

Dylan DeLucia led the way on the mound for the Rebels, earning his sixth win of the season through five innings pitched. He allowed four hits and two walks while striking out nine batters on 108 pitches.

Both teams battled evenly throughout the first two innings before Ole Miss drew first blood in the third inning with an RBI single from Tim Elko hit an RBI single and an RBI sac fly from Kemp Alderman.

Southern Miss still trailed closely after five but found itself behind ten after Ole Miss launched a deciding seven-spot in the sixth inning.

“I think the bottom line is in the first four innings, we had opportunities to get momentum and punch back when they were up 3-0 and get back on the board, and when you miss out on opportunities to get momentum, you actually just give more momentum to them,” Southern Miss Head Coach Scott Berry said. “I felt like that’s exactly what happened.”

Ole Miss on a hot streak

Ole Miss continued right where it left from in the Coral Gables Regional with a hitting performance that proved too much for Southern Miss’ pitching staff that ranks on the top of national leaderboards.

The Rebels showed their power last weekend with 33 combined hits in their three wins and again got to double digits with ten hits.

Coming from a three-home run against Arizona, Tim Elko led the Rebels with two hits and three RBIs. Calvin Harris also added two hits to the tally.

As a whole, Ole Miss is riding its hot streak with a 12-3 record in its last 15 games.

Despite a Southern Miss NCAA record-high 12 strikeouts from starting pitcher Hurston Waldrep, the Rebels got six hits and half of their runs off the sophomore after two scoreless innings.

“He [Waldrep] was terrific, and we’re fortunate we put some really good bats together,” Ole Miss head coach Mike Bianco said. “I thought we made him work really hard early, ran some of the pitches up, and then he looked like he lost his rhythm a little bit, and then Elko got a huge hit that busted the game open for us.”

Foul ball instead of grand slam

Down 3-0 in the fifth inning, the Golden Eagles were looking for anything to kickstart their lineup at-bat.

With two outs and the bases loaded, they turned to Reece Ewing to provide that spark, and for a moment, Golden Eagles fans celebrated what would have been a go-ahead grand slam.

The officials confirmed on a review that the ball sailed just inches past the right-field foul line, sucking the energy out of the park and going viral on social media.

Ewing then struck out, leaving all three runners stranded and Southern Miss scoreless for what would be their best opportunity of the game.

Running away with the game

The momentum shift was apparent following the missed grand slam.

Southern Miss turned to its bullpen in the sixth to relieve Waldrep, and the Rebels responded by more than tripling their score in a seven-run, five-hit inning.

Justin Storm came in to relieve Waldrep, but after just five pitches and two runs allowed, Tyler Stuart came in with a similar situation of loaded bases and no outs.

Stuart allowed three consecutive hits, including 2RBI doubles from Elko and Kevin Graham.

Drew Boyd ended the inning after allowing an RBI single, and Rodrigo Montenegro hit a total of five passed balls in the game at catcher.

The game passed quickly after the seventh inning and remained the same score for the final of 10-0.

While a ten-run deficit to start the Super Regional is not all similar to Southern Miss’ first-game loss to LSU in the Hattiesburg Regional, the team has found itself in a must-win situation.

“That will definitely help us because we’ve been there before,” Slade Wilks said. “We know what it’s like, and we can’t lose another game - [our] backs are against the wall.”

Southern Miss faces Ole Miss again Sunday at 3 p.m. at Pete Taylor Park.

This story was originally published June 11, 2022 at 7:30 PM.