It’s not often that the home crowd gives the opposing pitcher a standing ovation.
But that was the case for Old Dominion’s Blake Morgan as he exited the game in the eighth inning after the left-hander threw seven scoreless innings against Southern Miss.
“I think (the crowd) recognized the performance he had,” Southern Miss coach Christian Ostrander said. “Our fans are great baseball fans. He was lights out. That’s all I can say.”
Southern Miss’ lineup simply had no answers for Morgan and did not have enough momentum too late as the Golden Eagles fell to the Monarchs 4-1 on Sunday.
“(Morgan) was really good,” Ostrander said. “I tip my hat to him. He pitched the game they needed him to pitch. We never made him uncomfortable really. I credit him, but to do what we want to do and win championships, you have to find a way to cut down that tree. We just didn’t get enough swings with that axe to get him out early enough.”
In seven complete innings, Morgan held Southern Miss (14-6, 2-1 SBC) to six hits and one run while striking out six batters and not allowing any walks from 110 pitches thrown.
“We knew going in that he had a three-pitch mix, and that he was going to command his stuff well,” said third baseman Drey Barrett said. “That guy was a good pitcher. He had good stuff, and we knew we were going to be in a dogfight today.
“He commanded every pitch well.”
On the opposite side of the mound, Southern Miss’ starting pitcher Grayden Harris also got off to a strong start as he struck out the first five batters he saw. However, the true freshman gave up an RBI sac fly in the third and then a two-out RBI triple to give ODU a 2-0 lead.
“Everything felt pretty good today,” Harris said. “I just started losing the changeup a little bit later. We got things to work on from today and throughout this week to get ready for the next start.
“They were just waiting for me to throw strikes. They are a really good hitting team, so they had a plan going into today. They ended up beating me. It happens. It’s baseball.”
Old Dominion (5-12, 2-1 SBC) tacked on an extra run in the seventh from a solo homer.
Morgan retired the first eight batters he saw, while five of the six hits he gave up came on two outs.
However, Barrett broke up Morgan’s potential shutout in the eighth inning. Facing a full count, Barrett hit a solo home run that traveled over the Coca-Cola sign in left field.
“The at-bats before that, he threw me a lot of changeups,” Barrett said. “I took a couple of good pitches and made the count full. I kind of picked up that he tipped his fastball a little bit. He looked a little more amped up. I saw that and was able to get my barrel to it.”
Morgan exited the game after Barrett’s home run, but the momentum was short-lived after USM gave up an RBI single in the top of the ninth.
“We just have to do a better job when we run into that, and we will,” Ostrander said. “We just have to try and take something away from him and get his pitch count up earlier.”
In the bottom of the frame, Barrett had a second chance for heroics in after the Golden Eagles loaded the bases with two outs, but the freshman grounded out to end the game.
“That’s a good team over there,” Barrett said. When we go up 2-0, we want to sweep, especially in this conference. There are a bunch of really good teams. Every team is good, so we need to sweep when we can.
“We still had a good week. We went 3-1, but we want to go 4-0.”
Southern Miss will face No. 13 Ole Miss at Trustmark Park in Pearl, Miss., on Tuesday. First pitch is set for 6 p.m.
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