OMAHA, Neb. — Ole Miss, one of the last four teams invited to the NCAA baseball tournament, is now one win away from being the last team standing.
Mississippi defeated Oklahoma 10-3 in the first contest of the men’s best-of-three finals of the College World Series, propelled to victory by an unusual arm: relief pitcher Jack Dougherty. The runner-up from Collierville, Tennessee, had to be used as a starter because the team’s 1-2 aces were depleted in the march from Mississippi to that championship series. The right-hander responded with his longest outing of the season: five innings of perfect baseball before exiting the mound in the sixth with a 4-1 lead and bases loaded with no outs. His relief came from a freshman, right-hander Mason Nichols, who hit five of the seven batters he faced in two innings of work and gave up just one run, which Dougherty was blamed for.
A trio of ole miss pitchers — Dougherty, Nichols and sophomore Josh Mallitz — enjoyed an early-established cushion as their batting teammates scored two runs at the top of the first and added another each in the second and third innings. The last of these came from the pen of five-year-old and up-and-coming folk hero Tim Elko of Oxford, Mississippi, who blasted his 24th homer of the season, the culmination of a 4-for-5 night at the plate, which was the top four -Hit outing for every MCWS batter since 2009.
When teammates TJ McCants, Calvin Harris and Justin Bench hit consecutive home runs at the top of the eighth — the first team to do so since LSU in 1998 — the score was 8-2 and the game was essentially over.
Oklahoma missed the opportunity in what looked like a huge mismatch on paper, sending ace Jake Bennett up the mound with a week off after not serving since the Sooners’ MCWS opening game against Texas A&M on June 17 . Now, Ole Miss will have No. 2 starter Hunter Elliott and his perfect postseason record Sunday afternoon on the mound with a chance to clinch the title after five days out. Should a Game 3 become necessary on Monday, the Rebels could probably at least have ace Dylan DeLucia available for some work after his brave shutout on Thursday afternoon that propelled Ole Miss to the Finals.
The University of Mississippi is not only one win away from its first MCWS title, but also from the school’s second-ever NCAA-recognized national championship in a team sport. Just a year ago, the women’s golf team won the university’s first title. The school claims three national titles in football from 1958 to 1960, but none of these have been honored by the Associated Press or coaching polls.