Injuries and midseason doldrums hit the Rebels hard this season, but at the end of the day, the kids are all right.

Ole Miss, whether Thursday’s win locked it up at night, has secured postseason baseball at Swayze Field, fighting back from a four-run deficit to beat Georgia, 8-5, in 11 innings on Friday and secure the series.

But, more importantly, the win pushes Ole Miss (38-16) to 18-11 in the SEC. The regional host is secured and the Rebels go into the final day of the regular season with a chance at a top-four finish in the conference, and likely a top-eight national seed still within reach, though a bit more work and some outside help is probably needed.

Finishing in the top four in the SEC would give Ole Miss a bye into the double elimination portion of the conference tournament on Wednesday and a positive optics push for national seed purposes.

The Rebels are currently the No. 5 seed in the SEC but can move to No. 3 with a win, a Mississippi State loss and a Tennessee loss or No. 4 with a win and a Tennessee loss. Ole Miss will be the No. 5 seed and play the No. 12 seed in a single elimination game on Tuesday in Hoover if it wins and Tennessee wins.

If Ole Miss loses on Saturday in the 1 p.m. CT start, the Rebels are the five seed if Florida loses or the six seed if Florida wins.

The Rebels are No. 13 in the RPI.

We’ll get to the freshmen and the home runs in a minute, but Brandon Johnson’s emergence and shutdown outing on Friday was the story of the game and maybe a golden situation that could dictate Ole Miss’ postseason.

Prior to the Saturday appearance against Vanderbilt, Johnson had only nine outings on the season, a collection of short stints against mid-majors. He hadn’t thrown two more innings in an appearance since the first weekend of the season, but he’s now done it three times in a row — all in a week’s time.

Johnson pitched two innings against Vanderbilt, 2.2 versus UT Martin and 2.2 to extend the game on Friday against Georgia. Featuring a fastball that got up to 97 MPH and an evolving slider that makes him far more than just velocity, the junior college transfer pitched with intensity and got through an inherited situation and two do-or-die innings.

Johnson relieved Jackson Kimbrell with two on and on out in the eighth and threw eight pitches to get the two outs and keep Ole Miss in a tie game. He stranded two in the ninth and worked around a leadoff single in the 10th, keeping his velocity and energy through 43 pitches.

Ole Miss went to Taylor Broadway for an eight-pitch, one-inning save in the 11th, but Johnson made that possible and may be the biggest gift of the past weeks, as he attempts to occupy a role that likely would have gone to Max Cioffi before his elbow injury.

“It’s been super dominant,” Mike Bianco said. “I’ve seen really good fastball command tonight it was a wipeout slider. More than a secondary pitch, it had swing and miss. And he’s pitching with so much confidence and it shows.”

Ole Miss trailed 5-1 in the eighth inning and hadn’t done much of anything offensively since a Jacob Gonzalez solo home run in the fourth. But as this offense does, it produced a four-at-bat flurry to tie the game. Justin Bench and Jacob Gonzalez singled and Kevin Graham hit a 2-1 pitch well out of Foley Field to cut the deficit to one.

Tim Elko, in his first week as the designated hitter with the torn ACL, hit an absolute no-doubter a batter latter to tie the game. The left fielder didn’t make a play on the ball or move, other than to crouch and watch it go over.

Three innings later, with a runner on and two outs, Ole Miss took advantage of the lineup turning over and picked up three straight singles to left field from TJ McCants, Gonzalez and Graham. Each scored a run to give Ole Miss more than enough cushion for the home half of the inning.

“The credit goes to the offense,” Bianco said. “Good for our guys to keep composure and not give up. Gonzalez had a good game, but McCants had some tough at-bats before that. He’s so good because he forgets those at-bats and doesn’t take it with him. We hung in there and figured it out.”

McCants and Gonzalez are in the running for SEC Freshman of the Year, and their best work is in league games. McCants has a .364 average and .996 in SEC play, and Gonzalez is at .331 and .954. McCants has multiple hits in four of his last six games, and Gonzalez has 10 hits in his last five games and a four-hit game 10 days ago. They are tied fr the team lead in SEC runs scored, and Gonzalez has the team lead in SEC RBIs.

Graham has now reached base in 47 straight games after a three-hit night including the home run that got Ole Miss back into it. He has power to both sides of the field, he hits left-handers, and his 11th-inning single was a perfect example of situational hitting to the left side. His all-around game needs to be talked about more.

Ole Miss was just 1-for-3 with runners in scoring position and 3-for-15 with runners on base prior to the 11th inning.

Thinks looked to be unraveling for Derek Diamond in the second and third innings, as Georgia picked up a 3-0 lead on five hits and a hit by pitch in those two innings, but Diamond steadied himself, in what may be a very important sign of his maturation. He retired eight in a row before a leadoff double in the sixth inning.

Pitching into the sixth inning was a major accomplishment after the early going, and it saved Ole Miss from considerable bullpen work. Jack Dougherty has yet to pitch this weekend.

Diamond’s areas of improvement are to get off the field with two outs to limit damage and to have a cornerback memory and not let adversity fester. It was an important game for the latter.

Georgia is likely out of the NCAA Tournament picture barring some Hoover run. The Bulldogs are 29-23 overall and 12-17 in the SEC. The RPI is at 46. It’s fallen eight spots the past two days.

Ole Miss has been a remarkably tough team. We can debate in-game decisions and base running and bullpen situations, but the season has been a credit to the coaches and the leaders from a managing-people standpoint.

The injuries have hit three of the most important players on the team as well as early-season ailments to a couple other starters. And the four-series losing streak really reeled this team in the middle of conference play. A more fragile group may have folded instead of playing for a 19th conference win on the last day of the season.