The Texas A&M baseball team could not overcome the bullpen of Mississippi State, falling 3-2 loss to Mississippi State on Saturday afternoon.
“Well, there certainly was [some],” A&M head coach Rob Childress said about the Aggies’ missed opportunities. “You have to give Mississippi State a lot of credit, they played almost a perfect game. They had a great start on the mound, made almost every routine play, every tough play as well. Hey did not have many opportunities to score, but when they had the opportunity, they cashed in…we did not have a lot of opportunities, but credit [Brown] and their defense, they did a nice job.”
Mississippi State (22-15, 6-8 SEC) gained the lead in the third inning with a home run from Cody Brown to put the Bulldogs up 1-0, the first earned run that Aggie starter Kyle Simonds has allowed all year. Later in the inning, the Bulldogs got another across, but a good throw from JB Moss in center field gunned down another Bulldogs runner at the plate to end the inning and keep an extra run off the board. Mississippi State added another score later to make it a 3-0 game.
A&M (32-3, 10-3 SEC) got a run of its own after a Michael Barash RBI single that cut the lead to 3-1 after four innings of play.
From there, the Bulldogs shut down the lethal Aggie lineup. Mississippi State starting pitcher Preston Brown had a great outing on the mound, working seven innings, allowing one run on eight hits with two strikeouts. He threw 120 pitches on the afternoon.
“I think it was a matter of time before someone put some at-bats together,” Simonds said. “Unfortunately, we just came up short today, but that’s the way it goes, and we will come out ready to play tomorrow.”
After Brown exited the game, the Aggies started to attempt their rally. Logan Taylor hit a solo home run to left field, his second of the series, to cut the Bulldog lead to 3-2, but the Aggies could not muster another run.
A&M had a chance to tie it in the ninth, but after Choruby was caught stealing second base, Logan Nottebrok flew out to the outfield for the final out of the ballgame.
The Aggie bats could not get going due to the great pitching performance from Brown. A&M also shot themselves in the foot, batting 2-for-7 with runners in scoring position. The Aggies also left nine runners on base.
“We had a lot of opportunities to score, we just could not piece anything together,” Aggie catcher Michael Barash said. “[Taylor] hit a bomb, and early in the game we had another opportunity. We left a lot of guys on base with some roll over ground balls, but we will correct that and tomorrow will be a better day.”
This season, the Aggies are 0-3 when scoring two runs or less in a game. The win for the Bulldogs ties the series. The rubber match is set for 1:05 pm tomorrow afternoon.
