BILOXI – The Southern Miss Golden Eagles can let out a sigh of relief. They won’t have to sweat out Monday’s NCAA Regional selection show.
That’s because Southern Miss captured its second straight Conference USA Tournament Championship with a 4-0 win Sunday over Florida Atlantic. With the conference title, Southern Miss earns one of the 31 automatic qualifier spots in the NCAA Regionals.
It’s also the third title in the last four years.
“We knew what we had to do,” Matt Wallner, the tournament’s MVP, said. “D1(Baseball.com) still had us out of the field today if we lost, so we knew we had to come here and win today after having a great first three games. We blocked it out and got back to what we know what to do, and that’s winning baseball games.”
Wallner went 1-for-3 Sunday with an RBI, and he recorded a team-high seven hits in the four tournament games. He deserved the honor, but immediately credited his teammates following the win.
“It’s a great honor,” Wallner said. “We had some tremendous performances. Gabe Shepard, he was awesome. Erick Hoard got us a pinch hit in the Rice game, and so many guys stepped up for us and helped us to this championship. I’m lost for words for going out and winning this thing. I’m so proud of these guys.”
Shepard, Bryant Bowen, Fred Franklin, Danny Lynch and Walker Powell all earned spots on the Conference USA All-Tournament team.
The shutout Sunday was Southern Miss’ second-in-a-row after Saturday’s combined no-hitter. Also, the pitching staff hasn’t allowed a run since the eighth inning in the winner’s bracket game against Marshall Thursday, making it 19 innings of scoreless ball.
The team earned run average for the tournament was 1.46.
In the fourth game of the week, Southern Miss coach Scott Berry and pitching coach Christian Ostrander turned to two starting pitchers who already pitched this week. Walker Powell worked 6.1 innings on Wednesday and Stevie Powers turned in 3.2 innings on Thursday, and both helped keep FAU off the board Sunday.
After the Golden Eagles won Saturday, Powell approached Powers about the two pitching Sunday. Both wanted to help Southern Miss claim another conference title.
Powell pitched the first four innings of the day, and he scattered five hits with two strikeouts. He said he felt normal after his outing, but did feel a little more soreness in his arm. He expected that, though.
“We may want to shorten him on rest,” Berry said. “He looked like he had as good of stuff as I’ve seen. Of course, you have adrenaline that’s factoring in to this thing.”
After Sean Tweedy pitched the next 1.1 innings, Powers inherited two runners in the sixth and promptly pitched out of the jam. He ended up pitching 2.2 innings while allowing just two hits. The senior left-hander pounded his glove, pumped up the crowd and showed a lot of emotion every time he ended an inning.
It’s been awhile since he’s pitched with that much fire, he says.
“Not in a couple of years,” Powers said with the Conference USA trophy in his arms. “That was the first time I’ve been out in relief in a while. It was fun, we had a great time and everybody did their part today.”
Cody Carroll got one out in the ninth before FAU put two runners on, then Hunter Stanley got the final two outs to get his second save of the tournament. Both made their third appearance of the tournament in the championship game.
“We’re playing for a ring,” Powell said. “You can go a little bit more when something is on the line like that. That’s exactly what we did.”
Even though the Owls out-hit Southern Miss 10-7, FAU couldn’t scratch a run across while Southern Miss scored three early runs with a late insurance run. It grabbed a 1-0 lead in the second inning when Danny Lynch’s RBI scored Franklin, then Wallner made it 2-0 in the third with a single to left. USM plated another run two at-bats later when Cole Donaldson reached on a fielder’s choice that scored Matthew Guidry.
Guidry recorded the RBI in the seventh to push the lead to 4-0.
Southern Miss will find out Monday where it’ll play this weekend. The team will hold a watch party at Walk-Ons in Hattiesburg for the selection show, which starts at 11 a.m.
“Momentum, when you’re winning, it can be a monster,” Berry said.
