STARKVILLE — “It’s just one day.”
Therein lies Mississippi State baseball coach Andy Cannizaro’s simplistic approach to leaving the Auburn series behind him and his Bulldogs (30-16, 14-7 Southeastern Conference). Cannizaro was referencing Auburn sweeping a Saturday doubleheader, 17-8 and 5-3, to take the series, MSU’s first conference series loss being swept in the conference debut at Arkansas.
“At the end of (Saturday), let’s not lose sight of the fact that we beat Auburn (Friday),” Cannizaro said. “The weekend’s going to end, we’re going to be tied for first in the SEC and there’s nobody under the sun that thought we were going to be tied for first after seven weeks in the SEC.”
Auburn used the series win in Starkville to get into that tie with MSU atop the conference, which Kentucky joined by beating South Carolina on Sunday. The margin of error for that trio at the top is slim: Arkansas, LSU and Florida are all just a game back at 13-8.
Texas A&M, MSU’s next opponent, could join that group at 13-8 and one game back of MSU with a Sunday win over Missouri. Cannizaro knows it’s both a series and a standing MSU cannot win and retain without changes from Saturday.
“I just didn’t think we necessarily played good team baseball today,” Cannizaro said. “We’ve been clicking on all cylinders the last couple of weeks — swinging it well, pitching it well, playing quality defense — and there were glimpses of it today, but there were also gaps where Auburn scored 17 runs in three innings today.
“We need to use (Saturday) as a learning experience for our club and say, ‘Hey, when we’re winning, these are the things we’re doing well; when we lose, these are the things we don’t do well.'”
Among the biggest culprits on Cannizaro’s list: opportunities, both those missed by MSU and granted to Auburn.
MSU did the latter in the first game of Saturday’s doubleheader with eight walked batters, six wild pitches and five hit batters credited to MSU’s pitchers. The miscues often led to Auburn runs: in Auburn’s seven-run fourth inning, MSU threw a wild pitch, hit one batter with a pitch and walked two batters, one of those walks leading to a grand slam.
The Tigers also used two hit by pitches, a walk and a wild pitch to score five more in the eighth.
“They’re the No. 5 team in the country and it doesn’t matter who you play in the SEC, you can’t give them extra outs,” Cannizaro said.
MSU’s missed opportunities came in the second game.
The Bulldogs tallied 13 hits but scored just three runs while leaving 11 runners on base, in addition to help from two Auburn errors. MSU stranded the tying run on first in the seventh and another run on second in the eighth.
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brett Hudson on Twitter @Brett_Hudson
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 43 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.