By David Rogers. BOONE, N.C. — Kameron Miller made it interesting in the bottom of the ninth inning at Smith Stadium, slugging a one-out home run down the right field line to make it a 1-run ball game, but Southern Miss held App State in check the rest of the way to take a 7-6 win and sweep the weekend series, 3-0.
A right-handed hitter, Miller made contact with a low, first pitch fastball delivered by the Golden Eagles’ Landen Payne, digging it out to sail down the opposite field foul line for a 350-foot dinger. But Payne was able to get App State’s slugging first baseman, Juan Correa, to fly out to right and then secured the win by getting Mountaineer shortstop Tyler Lichtenberger to ground out to first for the third and final out.
After dropping Friday’s (April 25) contest 10-1 and Saturday’s (April 26) game 7-3, App State finally found some offense and it came from an unlikely place: the bottom third of the batting order. Right fielder Riley Luft, third baseman Tanner McCammon, and center fielder Charlie Evans accounted for six of the 11 Mountaineer hits, three of the runs scored and two RBIs.
Southern Mississippi’s offense was powered by three home runs, including solo shots off the bats of Matthew Russo in the third inning and Ozzie Pratt in the top of the 7th frame. The big blow came in the top of the 4th inning, Drey Barrett taking advantage of a light breeze blowing out to drive a ball over the fence in left center with two runners on base. The 3-RBI dinger gave the visitors from Hattiesburg, Miss., a 5-0 lead in the third inning. App State responded with four runs in the bottom half of the 4th inning to narrow the gap. The two Sun Belt Conference adversaries traded runs in the middle innings and late innings, but App State could never quite catch up.
Next up for the Mountaineers (21-22 overall, 11-10 in Sun Belt Conference) is a neutral site matchup with Wake Forest in Keeter Stadium (Shelby, N.C.) on Tuesday, April 29 (6 p.m.), then two road series in early May, one at Coastal Carolina (May 2-4) and the other at South Alabama (May 9-11). They close out the regular season at home against Georgia State (May 15-17).
The Sun Belt Conference tournament is slated for May 20-25, at Riverwalk Stadium in Montgomery, Ala.
In rankings kept by the NCAA for games played through April 20, the Sun Belt Conference had three teams in the nation’s Top 25 rankings: Troy (No. 20), Coastal Carolina (No. 21), and Southern Miss (No. 23).
The Sun Belt Conference RPI rankings published by the NCAA for games through April 24:
- No. 13 – Coastal Carolina
- No. 33 – Southern Miss
- No. 38 – Troy
- No. 85 – Texas State
- No. 93 – Georgia Southern
- No. 119 – Old Dominion
- No. 123 – Louisiana
- No. 127 – Georgia State
- No. 131 – South Alabama
- No. 154 – ULM
- No. 162 – Marshall
- No. 168 – Arkansas State
- No. 170 – App State
- No. 171 – James Madison
