STARKVILLE — With one swing, Mississippi State second baseman John Holland erased a week of frustration.
Holland also woke up the Mississippi State baseball team’s offense.
Stepping to the plate in a scoreless game against Auburn, Holland admitted he and his teammates were feeling the weight of a 29-inning scoring drought, one that dated back to last weekend’s series finale at Kentucky.
So when Holland saw a 1-1 fastball over the heart of the plate from starting pitcher Dalton Rentz, he knew just what to do with it. Turning on the pitch, Holland drove it over the right-field wall and onto the hill that overlooks the visitors’ bullpen at Dudy Noble Field. It was Holland’s first career home run and it kick-started MSU’s 3-1 series-ending victory.
“It was a fastball,” Holland said. “He missed on a changeup and then he gave me a gift in the middle of the plate. It seems like we’ve been down on ourselves, so that one run was huge. That finally got us going a little bit.”
Holland’s bomb was part of his breakout game for the Bulldogs. A junior college transfer who started his career at Florida State, Holland arrived at MSU last fall amid great fanfare. But until Sunday, he hadn’t quite delivered on that promise. But with a three-hit game, his second multi-hit performance of the weekend, Holland is suddenly one of MSU’s hottest hitters.
“I’ve been working with the coaches for the last few weeks,” Holland said. “I’ve been trying to simplify things a little bit and stay balanced in my swing. It’s nice to have a good game under my belt.”
That statement could apply to MSU’s offense. After getting a combined nine hits in back-to-back shutout losses to open the series, MSU had nine hits Sunday. Holland led the way with the home run and two singles, while senior first baseman Wes Rea delivered his first career triple as part of a two-hit, one-RBI day. Freshman Ryan Gridley added an RBI single for the Bulldogs (19-11, 3-6).
But the day belonged to Holland.
“Thank goodness John Holland did that for us today,” MSU coach John Cohen said. “John has worked so hard on his swing and it’s gotten so much better. He has really simplified some things and you could see this coming. Every day he’s gotten a little better, and it looks like he’s becoming what we thought he would be.”
Another dominant pitching performance helped make the win possible. Starting pitcher Vance Tatum and reliever Trevor Fitts allowed only four hits. Tatum pitched the first 4 2/3 innings and allowed one run, while Fitts pitched the final 4 1/3 innings to earn the win.
After the game, Fitts conceded that MSU’s pitching staff needed a breakout game, too.
“I know the hitters have been working their tails off,” Fitts said. “Something that has gotten lost in all this is that we (pitchers) are held to a high standard. We haven’t been living up to that standard, either. We’re supposed to be giving up less than four runs per game, and this was the first time in a couple of weeks we’ve done that.”
Auburn had only one runner reach third base. Fitts entered in that situation with runners on second and third base in the top of the fifth, and he immediately escaped harm. He didn’t run into any more trouble.
“I thought we got great pitching today,” Cohen said. ” We had two guys that went out there and competed their hearts out.”
MSU will play at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at South Alabama. It will play host to South Carolina in a three-game SEC series this weekend. Game 1 will be at 7 p.m. Thursday (ESPNU).
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brandon Walker on Twitter @BWonStateBeat
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