OXFORD | Southern Miss' final push fell flat in the sixth inning.
The Golden Eagles cut the Ole Miss lead to three runs and had the bases loaded when Brayden Jones entered for the Rebels. The inning ended three batters later, and the Rebels punctuated the evening soon after that.
On the strength of five multiple-run innings and some clutch pitching, Ole Miss beat Southern Miss, 15-8, in a matchup of ranked teams in Oxford. The No. 24 Rebels are 7-1, while Southern Miss fell to 7-2.
Jones induced a force out at home and a pop up before a three-pitch strikeout ended the threat. He didn't allow a run in 1.2 innings.
"That was the turning point," Mike Bianco said. "He's just been electric. BJ's stuff has ticked up, and that was the lift we needed."
Freshman Owen Paino, who started his career 1-for-15, hit his first career home run to start the next half inning and push the lead back to four runs. Austin Fawley also homered, and he twice walked with the bases loaded.
Both home runs went 417 feet.
"I care about how I swing, and Sunday, despite being 0-for-4, felt different," Paino said. "I blacked out a little bit going around the bases. This was awesome."
Ryan Moerman and Mitchell Sanford hit back-to-back home runs in the eighth inning.
The Rebels put two on in the bottom of the first to start and loaded the bases with one out. Judd Utermark's one hit was a 2-run single to start the scoring.
The Rebels had 11 hits and benefited from 11 walks, two errors and five hit by pitches. Moerman and Sanford also doubled. Ole Miss was 6-for-24 with runners on and 4-for-18 with runners in scoring position.
"You don't usually win with only three zeroes on defense, but we kept fighting and hitting," Bianco said.
Will McCausland started and went 3.1 innings, giving up six hits and four runs (three earned) with four strikeouts and one walk. He worked out of the third inning, allowing just one run despite an error and two hits.
Ole Miss overcame four errors -- one each from Luke Hill, Paino, Sanford and Will Furniss. Southern Miss hit four home runs.
"We came into the day with basically four errors on the season, and we didn't just have those plays," Bianco said. "We also lost one in the sun and had a couple wild throws. It was an uncharacteristic night."
Southern Miss used eight different pitchers in the eight defensive innings.
"They had a tough weekend and were down a little bit with their pitching," Bianco said. "Not taking any credit from us, but that didn't look like a typical USM pitching staff. We made them work, took the walks and really hit well in the late innings."
