Ole Miss Baseball and Softball enter the weekend hosting Top 10 opponents
Baseball
The Rebels will face perhaps their toughest test of the season. No. 6 Ole Miss will take on the No. 5 Tennessee Volunteers, who are 28-4 this season and boast series victories against Florida and No. 12 Alabama.
Tennessee, the reigning national champions, most recently defeated Alabama State 10-2 in their midweek match on Tuesday. The Vols tallied eight hits and drew 14 walks to get themselves back in the win column.
Last weekend, Tennessee dropped a three-game series at home against unranked Texas A&M, including a 6-17 clunker in the last game of the series.
Tennessee took game one, leaving the Aggies with a shutout. Game two and three went to the Aggies, where the Vols gave up a combined 26 runs and allowed 11 home runs.
Vols pitcher Liam Doyle helped secure their second no-hitter game of the season against Alabama State and enters this weekend’s series with SEC co-pitcher of the week honors. Doyle spent his first season with the Rebels prior to transferring to Tennessee.
The Rebels traveled to Lexington, Ky., for a three-game series against Kentucky last weekend.
Kentucky won the first game 5-4 in extra innings, despite a remarkable batting performance from third baseman Luke Hill who tallied three hits, a one-run homer in the seventh inning and three runs batted in.
Game two and three went to the Rebels following their close loss. Ole Miss won 3-1 and closed the series out with a dramatic win in extra innings 5-4.
On Tuesday, the Rebels traveled to Memphis to play the Tigers. On March 25, the Rebels defeated the Tigers 7-5 in Oxford. This game was a bit cleaner for Ole Miss, who won 10-0.
Softball
The Lady Rebels will host No. 8 Florida in a three-game series in Oxford.
The Gators, the 2024 SEC Tournament Champions, swept Auburn on the road two weeks ago but are coming off a series loss to the No. 10 Razorbacks.
Florida lost two of three games against Arkansas. The Gators fell 4-1 in game one but won 10-7 on Saturday to play for the series. The Gators ultimately fell on Sunday and dropped the series win with a 9-5 loss.
With the home field advantage, Ole Miss could have a decent advantage in this matchup. They are 30-9 on the season and have proven they can hang with some of the best teams in the conference.
The Lady Rebels lost a tightly contested three-game series against then No. 6 South Carolina this past weekend. They lost 1-0 in extra innings on Friday, won 2-1 on Saturday with a go-ahead RBI single by Jaden Pone and could not recover from a four-run first inning on Sunday, falling 4-2.
However, the Lady Rebels played well enough to sneak up to No. 19 in the USA Softball poll.
On Tuesday, Ole Miss got back on track with a 12-0 win in five innings against UT Martin. Lexie Brady launched two home runs and tallied five RBI’s on the night. With the victory, The Lady Rebels have reached 30 wins in the fastest time in program history.
