Mississippi
DeLucia pitches a gem as Ole Miss continues late-season magic
OMAHA — For six innings sturdy Dylan DeLucia had pitched the sport of his life. He had confronted 19 Auburn batters and retired 18, mixing pinpoint management of his 92-93 mph fastball with a devastating slider. Ole Miss led 5-0.
Then, within the seventh, Auburn led off the inning with three straight hits to attain a run and immediate a mound go to from No. 5, Ole Miss coach Mike Bianco. DeLucia had thrown 84 pitches to that time.
Would Bianco take him out? Or depart him in?
Bianco had no intentions — none in any respect, he mentioned afterward — of lifting DeLucia.
“I simply needed to test him emotionally,” Bianco mentioned. “He’s robust as heck, however, man, he will be emotional. And I simply needed to guarantee that we type of calmed him down a bit bit and obtained him again within the zone. That was it. I knew his stuff was good. … And so, I didn’t see a cause for him to return out with that lead.”
Sensible choice — one which helped the Rebels win 5-1.
DeLucia struck out the following batter, then obtained the following two with a weak fly ball and a pop-out. He fanned the primary two Auburn batters within the eighth inning, too.
Mentioned Bianco, “That’s what the great ones do. The great ones make pitches and get off the sphere. They don’t let it blow up on them. Dylan did that tonight.”
DeLucia — “Loosh” to his teammates and his followers — was solely marvelous. He wound up going 7.2 innings, permitting 4 hits and putting out 10. He pitched forward within the rely all through and didn’t stroll a single batter.
“DeLucia threw his fastball above us and his slider under us,” mentioned Auburn coach Butch Thompson, an Amory native and former Mississippi State pitching coach.
Ole Miss obtained all of the runs the Rebs would want within the first inning, plating two runs on Kemp Alderman’s smashed two-run, line-drive single to left area. Kevin Graham, who had doubled earlier than that, then added a solo residence run to left area within the third, and the Rebels scored two extra within the sixth.
So this fairy tale-like Ole Miss postseason continues. After ending the season with an earthly 32-22 document and coming inside an eyelash of being omitted of the NCAA Event, the Rebels have now gained six straight NCAA video games and have out-scored their opponents by a whopping 51-12. That’s proper: 51 to 12.
The Rebels will face Arkansas, which earlier within the day slammed No. 2 Stanford 17-2, on Monday at 6 p.m. The winner of that one might be only one victory away from enjoying within the Faculty World Sequence best-of-three championship collection.
On paper, Arkansas is a greater staff. The Razorbacks’ victory over Stanford was probably the most lopsided CWS sport in 34 years. Arkansas, which has gained 44 video games, gained two of three from Ole Miss at Oxford the final weekend of April.
Clearly, this can be a totally different Ole Miss staff than it was a month and a half in the past. These Rebels are enjoying baseball at a excessive, excessive degree in each side of the game. They’re pitching it effectively, pounding the strike zone. They’re hitting it laborious and doing so when it issues most. Take Alderman’s first inning single that got here with two outs. Certainly, all three Ole Miss hits in that inning got here with two out. That’s what coaches name well timed hitting. The Rebels have carried out it all through this 6-0 NCAA run. They’re catching it and throwing it effectively, too. A working example: In the event you didn’t see it, you need to have seen catcher Hayden Dunhurst whip a pick-off throw to first base for the third out of the eighth inning. In the event you blinked, you missed it.
One other big a part of this Ole Miss run is the bullpen. Josh Mallitz, who changed DeLucia with two outs within the eighth, struck out the aspect within the ninth inning. Mallitz has been virtually unhittable within the postseason.
One thing superb: The Rebels have pitched and performed so effectively right here these days, nearer Brandon Johnson has been nearly just like the Maytag repairman. You don’t usher in your nearer when you have got an enormous lead, and the Rebels have loved one in practically all these postseason video games.
They’re a assured staff.
Requested how the Rebels felt about enjoying Arkansas once more, Graham responded, “Good. At this level it doesn’t matter who you’re enjoying. Everyone is sweet. Everyone can beat everyone.”
Depend Ole Miss very a lot in that quantity.
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