Saturday, May 31, 2008

Rebs Shut Out in First Round


The Rebel bats were never able to get things going against Tiger ace Aaron Crow as Ole Miss (37-25) fell to No. 12 Missouri (39-19) by a score of 7-0 in the opening round of the NCAA Coral Gables Regional on Friday.With the loss, the Rebels fall into the loser’s bracket and will play Saturday at 11 a.m. CDT in an elimination game against Bethune-Cookman, who fell to overall top-seeded Miami Friday 7-4.Lance Lynn (7-4) suffered the loss as he worked 6.1 innings and allowed six runs on nine hits with two walks and seven strikeouts.Aaron Crow (13-0) picked up the win for the Tigers as he tossed a complete game shutout, striking out 10 batters and holding the Rebels to three hits. He walked three on the afternoon. It was his fourth complete-game shutout of the season.Brett Basham caught two runners stealing on the afternoon, pushing SEC leading total to 26 runners caught stealing this season. It is the most runners caught stealing by a catcher under Mike Bianco.“Aaron Crow had a great reputation coming into the game today and he was every bit of that reputation,” said Ole Miss head coach Mike Bianco. “I thought Lance got us out of a tough spot in the first inning only allowing one run, but one run might have been all it took today. Crow was just too good.”Missouri got off to a quick start, as the Tigers put three on to open the game with a walk, a single and a hit by pitch. An RBI fielder’s choice from Jacob Priday pushed the first run across as Ole Miss erased Aaron Senne from the basepath at second on the grounder to short. Lynn then hit the next batter to load the bases again but Lynn notched a strikeout and a groundout to get the Rebels out of the inning with Missouri only holding a 1-0 lead.The Tigers added to the lead in the fifth when Senne came up with a two RBI double to center field to push the Tigers out in front by two. Priday then singled to right field to score Senne and give Missouri a 4-0 advantage before the Rebels would get out of the inning as Basham threw out a runner stealing and Lynn struck out the final batter of the inning.Missouri added to the lead in the seventh inning when Trevor Coleman came up with a three-run home run with two outs off Rory McKean to give the Tigers a 7-0 lead. McKean entered to relieve Lynn with a runner on and a 3-1 count on Senne. McKean’s first pitch was a ball, putting Senne on base but Lynn was responsible for him. Priday then reached on a fielder’s choice as the Rebels got the second out of the inning on a force play at third before Coleman hit his home run.The Rebels would not give up another run, but couldn’t get on the board in the final two frames as Missouri claimed the win and advanced to play the winner of Miami and Bethune-Cookman in the winner’s bracket tomorrow.

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