Christian Ostrander and Southern Miss baseball have a real issue, and at the moment there isn’t much of an answer for it.
The hitting over the last several games has been downright atrocious.
Tonight, against the ninth-worst pitching team in the Sun Belt, Southern Miss mustered just seven hits, eight baserunners and went 1-for-3 with runners in scoring position in a series-opening 6-5 loss to Troy for the No. 12 Golden Eagles.
“Tip your hat to Troy,” Ostrander said. “They played really well. They pitched really well and they were real scrappy at the plate and capitalized on some mistakes.”
Southern Miss had just four hits through the first seven innings against another left-handed pitcher who was dealing. Trojan starter Benjamin Stubbs went 7.0 innings, allowing five hits, three earned runs, four strikeouts and two walks on 92 pitches.
“He had good stuff,” Ostrander said. “I thought early we didn’t let him get much rhythm, but then he settled in and started mixing better and did his job.”
Southern Miss jumped in front in the bottom of the first inning when Kyle Morrison homered to left-center field for his eighth of the year. The ball traveled 388 feet at 99 miles per hour. After Davis Gillespie tripled down the right-field line, Matthew Russo scored him with a sacrifice fly to put Southern Miss up 2-0.
But from there, the offense stalled, again.
Grayden Harris has worst outing of the season
Tuesday night, Ostrander stunned many by putting the previous Friday night starter in a relief role against Nicholls on the coast. Afterwards, Ostrander announced that Allen would not be the Friday night starter moving forward and instead move back into the bullpen.
This paved the way for sophomore Grayden Harris to get his first Friday night start of his career, which made sense as he had given up just one earned run in the past 19 innings he had pitched. Over that span, he had fanned 22 and walked just four.
But tonight, it was a different Harris.
His stuff was playing down, and he wasn’t locating his pitches. In the third inning, after two Trojans reached via single and walk, Jimmy Janicki smoked an 0-2 changeup that Harris had left high 418 feet to center field to put Troy up 3-2.
In the top of the fourth, after Morrison had tied the game with his second home run, the Trojans loaded the bases on Harris with one out. Harris fanned Steven Miller before Josh Pyne doubled to right-center to give the Trojans the lead for good at 5-3.
Harris was pulled in the sixth inning after Nolan Book doubled to center field.
His final line — 5.1 IP, 10 H, 5 ER, 1 BB, 6 K in 90 pitches.
“[His outing] was okay,” Ostrander said. “I don’t think it was as sharp as he’s been. They had something to do with that, but I think he would tell you that. I didn’t think his off-speed had as much action on it or depth that he’s been getting.”
The 10 hits and five earned runs were both the most he’s allowed all season to a Troy offense that is ranked ninth in the Sun Belt.
The Trojans added another pivotal run in the top of the seventh inning when Blake Cavill singled to the infield, driving in a run. All six of Troy’s runs came with two outs.
Allen came in from the pen and looked like the Allen that has been missing all season.
2.2 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 4 K, 0 BB in 55 pitches.
The offense for Southern Miss continues to slump
There wasn’t a lot of surprise when Troy announced they were moving their lefty Sunday starter to Friday night given how Southern Miss has hit lefties. Tonight continued that theme.
As aforementioned, Trojan starter Stubbs didn’t allow Southern Miss to get much traffic on the basepaths all night.
The bottom of the lineup for Southern Miss is a real issue.
They were 1-for-9 tonight, and all have been batting well below .300 in conference play. No offense can muster any rhythm when the bottom of the lineup isn’t contributing. It’s almost as if they are sacrificing every other inning with nothing but weak contact.
The approach is very puzzling. Ostrander said that he didn’t question his hitters’ approach after the game.
“You try to avoid the soft outs,” Ostrander said. “But you got to go up there ready to hit. You got to go up there looking for a pitch in a certain zone. Sometimes the pitcher wins that battle. But I don’t question the approach that they were taking. You got to stay in the moment and be a little bit more relaxed.”
But when the team is down one run in the bottom of the ninth and only four pitches are thrown, that just adds to the theme of a poor approach, especially against left-handed pitching. Southern Miss has lost three of its last five games, and all three have come against left-handed starters.
It’s a real issue, and they can’t expect the pitchers to come every single night and shut down teams every time.
With the loss, Southern Miss drops to 17-5 and 1-3 in the Sun Belt, hitting around .230 in league play. It’s their first 1-3 start in the league since joining in 2023.
They will look to even the series tomorrow at 2 p.m.
