STARKVILLE — The only thing beating the Mississippi State baseball team on Thursday was the unknown.
No. 1 Florida’s search for a third starting pitcher has been a turbulent affair for the second half of the season and one that took an interesting turn Thursday, with one candidate out with a shoulder impingement and another still recovering from pitching four days prior. Florida’s answer was Tommy Mace, a freshman making his first start in Southeastern Conference play.
The Bulldogs didn’t know what to do with him; his exit was all MSU needed to find its collective swing.
MSU was held to three hits with Mace on the mound but racked up four in the 1 2/3 innings without him, and those four hits may have officially saved the season. The onslaught against the Gator bullpen propelled MSU to a 6-3 win Thursday night, clinching MSU’s spot in the Southeastern Conference tournament and guaranteeing MSU will finish the season with at least a .500 record, which is required to earn a bid to the NCAA Tournament. The win bumped MSU’s Ratings Percentage Index (RPI), as projected by warrennolan.com, up to No. 28. The win gives MSU a 7-1 record against teams currently in the NCAA’s RPI top 10, alongside the three-game sweep of Arkansas and taking three of four over Ole Miss.
It was all made possible by a move to the bullpen.
“That guy was really good: he had fastball, curveball, changeup, he had everything working,” MSU freshman first baseman Tanner Allen said. “We expected to see their No. 1 guy (Brady Singer, the projected starter for Friday’s game), but he didn’t throw tonight. He shut us down pretty good, he’s a good midweek guy for a reason.”
MSU wasted no time jumping on the relief.
The third pitch from Florida’s first reliever, Jordan Butler, was hit to pure center field for Elijah MacNamee’s second home run of the season, a two-run shot that got the Bulldogs (29-24, 13-15 SEC) within a run.
In the next inning, sensing a dire situation, Florida turned to its closer Michael Byrne, he of 12 saves and a 1.29 earned run average entering Thursday. A throwing error put him in a bind and MSU’s leadoff hitter Jake Mangum made him pay with a two-run triple.
Allen delivered the death nail two at-bats later with a two-run home run over that same wall — and it wasn’t on his best swing. Allen was waiting for a first-pitch fastball but had to react to changeup.
“The only thing I was thinking was get one in the air and get the run in,” Allen said.
For the first time this season, with those two hard-hit balls to right, Byrne is the pitcher of record in a loss (2-1).
While MSU’s bats came alive against the bullpen, Florida (41-13, 20-8 SEC) had no answer for MSU’s one-man relief corps: Riley Self.
Self went from the missing man to the hero of old in one evening. His preseason shoulder surgery was credited as the blame for his prolonged absence in the middle of the season, forcing him to go nearly a month between appearances and nearly two months between appearances against SEC competition. The sophomore showed no signs of rust in throwing 2 2/3 perfect innings, striking out three as he collected the win (3-0).
“Not just getting right-handers out, but getting left-handers out when we needed him to be good,” MSU interim coach Gary Henderson said. “He got a little bit of chase that helped him there, obviously. The right-handers weren’t used to the late movement there in the eighth and Kevin did everything he could to get the left-handers in late, but if you throw strikes down it makes it really hard, and he did a wonderful job of that tonight.
“Not only a great job of executing his pitches, but when the game got tight, he did a good job of keeping his poise.”
That may be because he didn’t feel the pressure of pitching with the game on the line until the ninth inning. Self said he entered the game assuming he was being used as nothing more than a stop-gap, eating some outs in hopes that MSU could score some runs to get back in the game. From the eighth to the ninth, Self went from the man keeping MSU in the game to keeping MSU’s postseason hopes alive.
He did both. It’s possible his eight outs will be what gets MSU to the promised land that is a regional berth.
“I haven’t looked at anything. Do I think we should be in a regional? Sure, look at what we’ve done against top three teams in the country when we play them. Nobody can match that, I’d imagine,” Henderson said. “What’s more appropriate for me to address is how we’re going to play tomorrow, we’ll get to those things down the road.”
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 41 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.