Black teams takes Black and Gold Game 8-7

The Black team scored three runs in the tenth inning, and held off the Gold team rally to win 8-7 in the annual Southern Miss baseball Black and Gold Game.

“Overall the play today wasn’t the best, but some of the players we need to play good this season had good days today,” Head Coach Scott Berry said. “I thought we pitched the ball well and played good defense again today.”

The Black team started the scoring by loading the bases off of Cameron Giannini in the second inning. A Blake Brown walk scored Neil Dawson, putting the Black team up 1-0 after two innings.

The Black team added another run off James McMahon in the top of the fifth, when Chase Fowler scored on a single by Breck Kline. The Gold squad got on the board in the bottom of the fifth when Isaac Rodriguez followed a Michael Sterling single with a double off the wall, scoring Sterling.

The Black team then extended the lead to three in the top of the sixth on RBI singles by Fowler and Kline, making it 4-1. 

The Gold team cut the lead to two on Austin Roussel’s single to center, scoring Isaac Rodriguez, who led off the inning with a walk. Daniel Wineski then struck out Joey Harris with two runners on base, ending the threat in the bottom of the seventh.

Michael Sterling and Mason Robbins drew back-to-back walks to begin the bottom of eighth off of Black team reliever Cody Carroll. Sterling scored on a Rodriguez single up the middle, and Robbins on Bradley Roney’s sacrifice fly to left.

Roussel then hit a line drive to center, which was misplayed, scoring Rodriguez all the way from first base.  Taylor Nunez came on in relief of Carroll to get out of a bases loaded jam without giving up a run, notching the win.

Fowler knotted the game at 5 in the first half of the ninth inning, knocking in Neil Dawson who reached on a bunt single. Fowler had four of the seven hits for the black team.

“I knew it was probably my last intra-squad game I would ever play, so I just came out there with some energy and didn’t take anything for granted,” Fowler said. “I was just trying to jump on the fastball when I got it, and keep it simple at the plate and it worked out for me today.”

Nunez forced Joey Harris into a double play with one outs and the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth to preserve the tie score.  

Pierce, Myrick, Lowery, and Livingston combined to pitch four scoreless innings to get the Black team off on the right foot and they scored 3 run the top of the tenth, two on a RBI single by Dillon Day to seal the victory.

“I thought we worked extremely hard this fall, and I am impressed with the way we pitched the baseball, and the offense will come with time and work,” Berry said. “We have good depth on the mound and I have an overall good feeling about our team heading into the spring.”