COLUMN: When you’re hot, you’re hot and so far this weekend the Ole Miss baseball team is hot

The late Jerry Reed’s most famous song could be applied to anything in life, and it certainly applies to the 2024 Ole Miss baseball team.

“When you’re hot you’re hot, and when you’re not, you’re not.”

Right now, this enigma of a hardball squad is hot having beaten No. 3 Texas A&M the first two games of a three-game set that concludes Sunday afternoon.

For most of this season, the Rebels have been puzzling. You knew whenever they rolled out the balls you could get a team that could win series over South Carolina, Mississippi State and Texas A&M or get swept by Kentucky and Arkansas.

Unfortunately, they have been on the “L” side of the ledger more than the “W” side in league play thanks in no small part to those two sweeps.

So excuse us if, coming off a midweek loss to Murray State, we weren’t expecting great things this weekend against a powerful Aggie team that found itself number one in the nation in spurts this season.

Friday’s thriller against the Aggies took a come-from-behind effort with two late runs in the bottom of the eighth inning to win 4-3.

But Saturday’s game was all Ole Miss, starting with a 5-run second inning and a 3-run fourth frame while starting pitcher Liam Doyle was holding the potent Aggie lineup to one solo home run through six masterful innings.

The Rebel coaching staff opted to change up the lineup some and insert lightly used Reagan Burford at second base while moving Luke Hill back to shortstop from second.

The move paid dividends in the second inning Saturday with Burford getting the Ole Miss scoring going with a 2-run homer over the left centerfield wall. The bottom of the lineup kept churning with right fielder Treyson Hughes and catcher Eli Berch reaching base, setting the table for leadoff batter Hill to single in a run and then 3B Andrew Fischer doubling in Berch and Hill for the early crooked number 5 on the scoreboard.

Burford drove in another run with a sacrifice fly in the third inning and in the fourth the Rebels went up 9-1 on a two-run single by left fielder Jackson Ross and an RBI-double by centerfielder Ethan Groff.

Meanwhile, Doyle was keeping the Aggies at bay ending up with 7 strikeouts and zero walks on the day. He only allowed 4 hits through his 6 innings of work.

“Once we got the five runs in the second, my job was to fill up the zone and let the defense work and they did just that,” said Doyle, “and Josh (Mallitz) came in and closed things out looking great doing it.”

“Liam was dominant and Josh was terrific as well,” said Ole Miss head coach Mike Bianco. “It was great to see some of our seniors come through on senior day and to see our captain, Burf (Reagan Burford) starting things off was special to me.”

The Rebels tacked on another run in the bottom of the eighth for good measure with designated hitter Campbell Smithwick doubling in first baseman Will Furniss who had singled to get things going offensively again.

Ole Miss reliever Josh Mallitz came in and worked three innings, allowing one inconsequential run in the ninth, to close out the 10-2 Rebel win.

What is it going to take for the Rebels to finish the Aggies off Sunday afternoon?

More of the same of what we’ve seen the first two games of this set.

When you’re hot, you’re hot.

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