Rebels Open With Sweep

Stuart Turner First Career Hit As A Rebel was A Grand Slam.

By: Adam Brown, Sports Editor HottyToddy.com

adam.brown@hottytoddy.com

Photo by Peyton Spear

Game three between the No. 14  Ole Miss Rebels and the No.12 Texas Christian University Horned Frogs was not for the faint of hearts. In the end the Rebels pulled off a  5-2 win sweeping  TCU in front of a crowd of over seven thousand fans to witness Ole Miss starting the season out with a prefect record.

In the first two games of the series for the most part, it was a complete pitching dual, with a few big innings of offense.  In today’s, game the Horned Frogs and the Rebels both put on an electric first inning display of hitting with TCU’s Jantzen Witte, hitting a solo home run to left field giving his team an early one run lead over the Rebels.

Ole Miss would quickly answer the home run hit by Witte from TCU with a grand slam home run by junior Stuart Turner in the bottom of the first.  Turner’s grand slam was his first career hit as a Ole Miss Rebel which just happened to be a home run.  The Rebels sent nine men to the plate in the bottom of the first. Once Ole Miss took a 4-1 lead they never looked back.

“Me and my roommate were talking right before the game about what a better time it would be to get our first career hits over here with a two out RBI situation.  Just after the inning they had with the home run I got a good swing on the ball,” Turner said.

In the fourth inning Austin Anderson hits a RBI double to left center field to score Tanner Mathis from first base to give the Rebels their last run of the day and pushing their lead to 5-1 over the Horned Frogs.  TCU would answer back in the top half of the sixth inning as Witte doubled and was later brought around to score.

In the seventh inning the Horned Frogs threatened to tie the game again as they had the bases loaded and two outs.  Coach Mike Bianco makes a call to the bullpen to bring in red shirt sophomore Scott Weathersby to pitch in his first college game in the biggest situation.  Weathersby got the first batter he faced to ground out to end the inning.

“ It was so much fun! You got people like Tanner Bailey and Brett Huber kind of mentoring me for a couple of years and when I was down in the bullpen Tanner Bailey was reminding  me just to breath, breath and when I got out there I just trying to breath and make pitches,” Weathersby said.

Coach Bianco committed on the pitching performance that Weathersby gave the Rebels out of the bullpen in the seventh inning with the bases loaded.

“One of those where you know as a coach there are certain situations where you need a guy to throw the ball through the strike zone and throw more than one pitch in the strike zone and that is it. He is a guy that is going to pound the strike zone with a couple of different pitches and with the lead we needed it.   Of course you hope that’s not their first college appearance with bases loaded, but I think its neat when that happens to good kids and kids who deserve it.  You could really feel the energy in the dug out with players on the top step behind him wanting him to succeed.  I know I felt it too while calling the pitches that he was going to get through it knowing all his teammates were behind him,” Bianco said

The Rebels next game will be on Wednesday February 20th as they face the University of Tennessee at Martin.  First pitch will be at 4:00PM.