(Photos/Sean Smith)
Southern Miss defeated the defending national champions Mississippi State by a score of 7-1 in Pearl, Mississippi thanks to strong pitching and the play of the Montenegro brothers.
Southern Miss tallied seven hits with five of them coming from Gabe and Rodrigo Montenegro.
Starting pitcher Tanner Hall pitched the longest any Southern Miss pitcher had this season with a strong performance of a career-high 13 strikeouts and five hits allowed with no runs, errors or walks in seven innings played.
“I just had some good fastball command early today, and my changeups have been feeling good, so I was just kind of grooving a bit,” Hall said.
Hall was doing more than just grooving-he was a force on the mound. In a pivotal moment in the game, the Bulldogs loaded the bases with two outs. The pitching coach for Southern Miss, Christian Ostrander, went out from the dugout to talk with Hall.
“He came to me and said, go get this guy- you want it right?” Hall said. “I said, ‘I want it, this is it right here.’ I had pretty good confidence to make a pitch to get us out of the situation and doing my job, and it went pretty well.”
Hall struck out Aaron Downs and retired the side, not giving up a run to the Bulldogs. Considering the opponent and the line he posted, his pitching might go down as one of the best midweek starts in Southern Miss history.
“I do not know what else you can say about him and his performance tonight,” Head Coach Scott Berry said.
The Montenegro brothers had a field day on the offensive side of the ball for Southern Miss. Gabe started the game going three for three and gave Southern Miss its first lead of the night with a three-run RBI triple.
“That’s just a great feeling as soon as I hit it, I felt like I [had] at least one run in,” Montenegro said. “It is a great feeling to be able to help out the team.”
After Montenegro’s triple, there was no looking back for Southern Miss as they rolled to victory behind the stellar performance of the bats.
The team had struggled at-bat in their two losses, but the bats were rolling and Southern Miss rolled the defending national champions.
Southern Miss will be back in action as they go on the road for a series against Louisiana Lafayette, starting Friday at 6 p.m.
