OXFORD — Thomas Dillard, Cole Zabowski, and Jacob Adams hit home runs Sunday to lead the No. 11 Ole Miss baseball team to a 5-0 victory against Tennessee.
The Rebels (19-2, 2-1 Southeastern Conference) used their third three-home run game of the season to win the series.
James McArthur and Parker Caracci shut down Tennessee (13-8, 1-2) on four hits for the Rebels’ second shutout. McArthur and Caracci combined for 11 strikeouts.
Adams led off with a home run to right field. It was the Rebels’ first leadoff home run since Tate Blackman did the same on April 28, 2017.
Ryan Olenek added the team’s final run on an RBI double in the fifth.
McArthur, a junior who was making his fifth-consecutive Sunday start, went six innings and allowed two hits. He struck out four and walked three.
Caracci, a redshirt sophomore, struck out seven for his first save.
Ole Miss will play host to New Orleans at 11 a.m. Tuesday in the annual kids’ day game.
n Georgia 6, Alabama 5: At Tuscaloosa, Alabama, the Bulldogs claimed the series finale against the Crimson Tide (16-5, 1-2) to gain the series victory at Sewell-Thomas Stadium.
“It was a tough day,” Alabama coach Brad Bohannon said. “We were a swing away from being 3-0 in the league and also a swing away from being 0-3. That’s SEC baseball for you. The kids competed really well over a three-day period, but we’ve got to play cleaner baseball. I didn’t think the quality of our at-bats were quite to the level that they could’ve been. Three of the six guys that scored today (for Georgia), we walked them, and we had a couple of minor defensive miscues. The kids are competing really hard, there’s just a very small margin of error in SEC baseball.”
Alabama evened the score once and was within one run of tying the game twice. Georgia’s two unearned runs in the eighth proved to be the difference after a defensive miscue by Alabama extended the inning before an eventual home run secured the win.
Junior Chandler Taylor had a home run for Alabama. It was his team-leading eighth of the season, and his fourth over his last five games.
Senior Chandler Avant had a two-out, two-run single to left-center field in the ninth to cut the deficit to 6-5. Junior Keith Holcombe followed with a missile on the ground toward first base, but a clean play by the first baseman ended the game.
Sophomore Davis Vainer (2-1) suffered the loss.
Alabama will head to Birmingham, Alabama, to take on UAB at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at Regions Field. The game can be seen live on Conference USA Television.
n Southern Mississippi-UTSA rained out: At Hattiesburg, the final game of the Conference USA season-opening series between No. 15 Southern Mississippi and UTSA was canceled Sunday after steady rains forced the game to be called off.
The Golden Eagles trailed 4-1 in the top of the second when the 10 a.m. game was delayed. After a two-hour, 30-minute delay, it was decided that the game couldn’t continue.
The game won’t be made up.
Southern Miss will play host to Southern at 6 p.m. Tuesday at Pete Taylor Park.
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