Southern Miss used all facets of its game to come out with a 6-1 win that clinched the series sweep over South Alabama on Sunday.
The best illustration came in the fifth and sixth innings as relief pitcher Niko Mazza preserved USM’s lead by forcing South Alabama to leave the bases loaded with inning-ending strikeouts each time. After Mazza’s big stands, USM promptly delivered two insurance runs to secure the victory.
“I think everybody is just clicking together right now,” said Mazza, who picked up the second save of his career. “Our offense and defense have been playing good together. The pitching has been good.”
The Golden Eagles have now won 10 straight games, which is the longest streak in the country. It’s also the sixth time in Southern Miss coach Scott Berry’s tenure that USM has won 10 or more games in a row.
“I think it’s a competitive attitude at the plate,” said Berry on what has been the difference during the win streak. “The more at-bats you get under your belt, the more confidence you get. When you have success, it breeds confidence. When you do it time and time, you feel like you have a chance to win. I feel like our pitching and bullpen has cleaned up, and we are getting stops…I think we have found the pieces in the bullpen.”
“We didn’t let off the gas pedal today. I’m proud of every phase of the game that we played. The mound was terrific.”
Southern Miss (32-15, 17-7 Sun Belt) jumped out to an early 2-0 lead in the first inning after Christopher Sargent and Reece Ewing delivered RBI singles.
The Golden Eagles extended the lead in the third with two more runs from RBI singles by Nick Monistere and Carson Paetow to go up 4-0.
On the mound, starting pitcher Matthew Adams had a no-hitter headlining into the top of the fourth, but the Jaguars (23-24, 11-13) broke it up with a solo home run followed by a walk by Adams. In 3.1 innings, Adams struck out five batters and walked three.
“Matt Adams looked really good with a really tight zone,” Berry said. “He had to navigate through some things there and pitches that didn’t go his way. He was able to minimize.”
With a runner on first, relief pitcher Chase Adams induced a ground ball and a strikeout to get out of the inning. The true freshman’s performance earned him the first win of his career.
Mazza then shut down South Alabama for five scoreless innings while recording nine strikeouts. Mazza stranded seven of South Alabama’s 11 runners left on base. Six of those came in the back-to-back innings where he got out of the bases-loaded situations with a strikeout.
“I just bared down and tried to make good pitches,” Mazza said. “Obviously, we have good hitters that we are facing, so I was just trying to execute. I can’t blame anybody else. I put myself in that situation, so it’s only right if I get out of it.
“Everything was working today. The fastball felt good, and the slider was good.”
Southern Miss tacked on a run in the sixth inning after a balk was called on South Alabama’s pitcher, which allowed Rodrigo Montenegro to score. Then in the seventh inning, Danny Lynch maintained his production over the weekend as he hit a solo home run over the right field wall, which was his fifth hit and RBI of the series.
“He was awesome,” said Lynch of Mazza. “It’s pretty unhittable when Niko is doing that. He’s really come a long way. Earlier in the year, when that would have happened, it would have spiraled out for him. We saw it two Sundays in a row. It's kind of spiraled for him, but he has grown up a bunch. Now when he gets into those jams, he’s able to calm himself down, reset, and make huge pitches like he did all day. Once he got out of that second jam, he kind of just cruised.”
Southern Miss goes on the road next weekend to face Louisiana-Monroe. First pitch for Friday’s game is set for 6 p.m.
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