FAYETTEVILLE – Southern Miss earned a spot in the Fayetteville Regional winner's bracket with a 9-0 win over Dallas Baptist Friday. Nick Sandlin pitched a gem in his seven-inning, shutout performance, and the Golden Eagles will now turn to Stevie Powers against Arkansas Saturday at 7 p.m. for the right to play in the Regional final Sunday. The hosts beat Oral Roberts 10-2 earlier in the day to set up the matchup with the Golden Eagles.
NOTES:
- The Golden Eagles opened their 15th appearance to the NCAA Tournament and first-ever appearance in Fayetteville, Ark., with a 9-0 victory over Dallas Baptist. The Golden Eagles improved to 20-29 in NCAA games.
- The shutout was the first for the Golden Eagles in NCAA play since an 18-0 victory over Murray State in the 2003 Hattiesburg Regional and second overall. It was also the team’s eighth blanking of an opponent this season.
- Nick Sandlin tied a school NCAA record with 10 strikeouts, tying Bob McCrory who had that many against Southern (5/30/03).
- The Golden Eagles won their opening game for the third-straight trip, after defeating South Alabama in Tallahassee in 2016 (14-2) and UIC in Hattiesburg in 2017 (8-7).
- With his 10 strikeouts tonight, Sandlin now has 144, which is the third most in a USM single season and his 268 career punchouts moves him into sixth place.
- Luke Reynolds extended his current team-high hitting streak to 12 games with an RBI single in the eighth.
- Cole Donaldson collected a career-high five RBI on the strength of two doubles and a three-run homer.
Quotable:
Head Coach Scott Berry
Opening Statement
“I’m just real proud of the way our team came out from the start. That’s a very good Dallas Baptist team, a team that’s had 40 wins this year and plays in a really good conference. I think at the end of the day, our guys were able to establish some momentum, scoring five in the late innings and Nick Sandlin with his ability to keep the offense out of position from scoring. A couple of innings there, they had a chance to create some momentum, but he had a chance to pitch out of it. One was second and third with one out, and he got out there, the other was two innings later with the bases loaded and induced the 6‐4‐3 double play. I’m very proud of the way our guys competed. Cole Donaldson hit some backside balls the other way. (Mason) Irby had the other two‐out RBI, as well. I think that was a real big moment for us in that inning when we scored those two runs to make it 3‐0.”
On Nick Sandlin’s outing ...
“I’ll tell you, Dallas Baptist really battled him. Like he said, I thought that they really laid off of some pitches. He had his strikeouts, and he had 102 pitches is what he left the game at through seven innings. They ran that pitch count up...drew three walks, which is usually not him. I thought that they competed really well. Someone may argue and say ‘well they had 10 strikeouts’, they fatigued him and put some pressure on him. They were one swing away from really getting themselves back into it. They did a good job. We’re getting late in the year. He was tired. It was hot out there. I could tell he was ringing wet. Cole was ringing wet. I was glad we got them out there and let them recover.”
On tomorrow’s pitcher ...
“We’ll go with Stevie Powers. He’s a left‐handed pitcher. He’s been following Nick all year. We bumped him to Friday a couple of times when Nick was needing a little rest. He’s handled it really well. He’s a guy that throws strikes and pretty much your regular left-hander with three pitches. His first year he had five or six starts as a true freshman. Last year he had 29 appearances all out of the bullpen. We used him more of a matchup. This year because of the draft kind of gutting our weekend staff, with them all signing, that was the decision moving him into a starting role. Particularly having a left‐handed option. He is taking the challenge well for us this year. I’ve seen his development really improve each outing, as well as his confidence. We feel good with Stevie taking the mound tomorrow.”
Cole Donaldson
On his performance ...
“I feel pretty good. I don’t think it was my best game all year but I feel good after that. I need to get some fluids back in me and get ready to do it again tomorrow.”
On home run ...
“That pitch was a changeup. He started out with a fastball then breaking ball, fastball and changeup. I just wanted to go to that side of the field and he gave me a pitch to do it with.”
On five RBIs ...
“I went up there and just tried not to do too much. I went up in BP and started fiddling around and trying not to do too much. My first at‐bat I drew a walk, and the next few at‐bats, I zeroed in and looked for a pitch I could handle. I went from there.”
Nick Sandlin
On getting out of innings with runners in position ...
“I was trying to minimize in those innings. It was alright if one run scored. We had the lead the whole game pretty much with our offense hitting it pretty well. I was just trying to get some guys to chase and minimize.”
On throwing different pitches ...
“I don’t know how different it was from normal but I definitely had to throw sliders and changeups to keep them off balance. They had a really good approach. You could tell they could swing it, but we were lucky enough to have them (hit) right at us and I had good defense behind me.”
Dallas Baptist Patriots, head coach Dan Heefner
On getting more aggressive early in counts against Nick Sandlin ...
“Just as we watched what he did, he obviously is going to be around the strike zone. We knew that coming in. He also had a good strike zone to throw to tonight, and then the other thing was especially to our right‐handed hitters, it was almost all sliders to them. We were just telling them they need to sit on that and hunt that and if they get the good one early in the count, just go for it. He’s not a guy that doesn’t benefit you at all, you have to wait around for him. Because he does locate so well, if you get to two strikes then he’s able to extend it and he was getting some of those pitches, too.”
On what he saw from Sandlin when they had runners on base ...
“We did have some opportunities. The first time we had runners on second and third, we had a left-hander up and he located very well and threw some change‐ups down and away to our lefty. He threw them in the perfect spot. We could have done a better job at making those pitches be up in the zone and laid off of them. But, he did what good pitchers do in those situations and he executed his pitches. The second time, we had bases loaded with one out. Our guy got a fastball, I thought he did a good job at making an adjustment from his previous at‐bat where he was going to let the ball travel a little more and hit it harder right at shortstop but then it was an inning‐ending double play.”
Devlin Granberg
On his hits against Sandlin ...
“I think he located really well throughout the whole entire game. I thought he located all three pitches that he had, pretty much right at the knees the whole entire night against everybody. What we saw was he was throwing a lot of off‐speed early in the count. That’s just what we were hunting, and you just got to tip your cap to a guy like that. He owned his own the whole night. He didn’t really give us much to really drive and elevate.”
On the aggressiveness they gained early in the count against Sandlin ...
“That was the scouting report, we knew he was going to throw a lot of off‐speed. We knew he had really good numbers and there’s a reason for that. We knew he was going to be down in the zone, he was going to be a strike thrower. I think just after the first couple of innings we just made that effort because he was in the zone pretty much the whole entire game. We are pretty good on balls in the zone and I think we had some good barrels there they just didn’t fall for us.”
Trevor Conn
On the key to keeping Southern Miss hitters in check ...
“I think it was just getting in good counts and my changeups were really working for me so I then just was throwing that off the fastball.”
