STARKVILLE — Andy Cannizaro is staying far away from the panic button.
MSU’s baseball coach has no plans of making drastic changes to how he uses his personnel after Tuesday’s ninth-inning collapse in a 13-8 loss to Morehead State. If anything, he’s digging in with the same players expecting their rebound performances as MSU (3-2) hosts Indiana State and Marist this weekend.
MSU will play Indiana State at 4 p.m. today, a Saturday twinbill against Marist and Indiana State beginning at 1 p.m. before Sunday’s 1 p.m. finale against Marist.
“We met as a team before practice and talked about using that as a defining moment for our team and our program going forward,” Cannizaro said. “Don’t allow what happened on Tuesday night to dictate what’s going to happen this weekend. That’s over with.”
According to outfielder Brent Rooker, Cannizaro’s message was well-received.
“We’re still really positive in the locker room. We’re going to bounce back well from that,” he said. “We had a really good day of practice (Wednesday). I think the pitchers talked a little bit and they had a good day as well working with (pitching coach Gary) Henderson. The guys that threw on Tuesday that didn’t have their best outings are just ready to get back out there this weekend and reestablish themselves.”
Cannizaro especially applied that message to those pitchers, particularly those who were a part of Morehead State’s 10-run top of the ninth that led to the 13-8 loss. Among those pitchers was the team’s only senior, Blake Smith, who walked three and allowed four earned runs while recording one out on Tuesday; Cannizaro said he had a long meeting with Smith in his office leading up to this weekend.
“Tuesday night certainly didn’t happen the way we envisioned it to, the ninth inning certainly blew up on us, but I told all of those guys that pitched in the ninth inning that all of those guys are going out there this weekend,” Cannizaro said. “Those are the guys that pitch for us; this isn’t the big leagues where you can call four or five guys up from triple-A and get different guys out there. Those guys have won that role during the fall and the early part of the spring; Tuesday night just didn’t go well for those guys. I’m not going to hesitate to get them out there at all.”
Some of the early struggles could be expected, given the Bulldogs feature a young pitching staff with five pitchers making their first career appearance in the opening weekend.
“Now that we’re into our second weekend, hopefully everything will start to slow down for some guys and we can get back to just playing baseball,” Cannizaro said.
Cannizaro said after opening weekend that he is in no rush to determine set roles in the bullpen.
“We would like to have as good of an idea about our team as we can before we go on the road to start SEC play at Arkansas,” he said. “We want to have all of those roles figured out and an understanding of who we are as a team so we can hit the ground running in league play.”
While the bullpen pitchers work to regain their footing, the starters from the previous weekend have been given the same courtesy: Konnor Pilkington, Graham Ashcraft, Peyton Plumlee and Ryan Cyr will start the four games of the weekend.
The pitchers on the mound throughout the weekend maybe pitching without second baseman Hunter Stovall behind them. Stovall strained his hamstring in Tuesday’s loss to Morehead State; Cannizaro called him day to day.
If Stovall is to miss a game or more, Cannizaro did say both Harrison Bragg and Dustin Skelton will both see time in the infield this weekend; Skelton has previously started at catcher.
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brett Hudson on Twitter @Brett_Hudson
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