Baseball
No. 1 Ole Miss Takes Series from Auburn
Ole Miss secured its first series win on The Plains since 2009 on Saturday, capping a high-scoring weekend at Auburn with a 15-2 victory in the rubber game at Plainsman Park.
Jack Dougherty earned the win with five-plus strong innings on the mound, allowing one run with seven strikeouts. Hunter Elliott came on for three frames of relief with one run surrendered, while Brandon Johnson finished things off, retiring all three batters faced in the ninth.
Ole Miss (15-4, 2-1 SEC) capitalized on a dropped fly ball in left field to take the lead in the third. After Jacob Gonzalez scored on the error, TJ McCants and Tim Elko followed with RBI singles to make it 3-0.
The Tigers (14-6, 1-2 SEC) answered back with a run in the home half but a couple of innings later the Rebels broke things open. Hudson Sapp got the fun started, blasting a two-run double off the right field wall for his first career hit. Following a pitching change, Tim Elko took the first offering from Blake Burkhalter way over the high wall in left, a two-run no-doubt bomb.
The Rebels jumped right back on the offensive in the sixth, with the first five batters on the inning reaching. Kemp Alderman and Hayden Leatherwood led off with back-to-back jacks to right, followed by a Reagan Burford single, a Gonzalez double and a two-run single off the bat of Peyton Chatagnier and just like that a once close score was 11-1 in favor of Ole Miss.
Auburn got a run back in the bottom of the sixth but Elliott was able to leave the bases loaded to halt the momentum and Kemp Alderman got the run right back for Ole Miss with an RBI double down the right field line to score Justin Bench.
The Rebels kept their foot on the gas, with Elko and Hayden Dunhurst supplying RBI knocks in the eighth and Chatagnier finishing things off with an RBI single of his own in the ninth.
Courtesy of Ole Miss Sports