Cowbell Corner

Mississippi State Leans on Bullpen in Comeback Victory Over Tulane

Mississippi State used eight pitchers and a late offensive surge to rally past Tulane 11-7, showcasing the depth of its bullpen ahead of SEC play.
Taylor Hodges|
Mississippi State pitcher Chris Billingsley celebrates a clean inning against Tulane in Biloxi.
Mississippi State pitcher Chris Billingsley celebrates a clean inning against Tulane in Biloxi. | Mississippi State Athletics

No. 3 Mississippi State didn’t need a close, exciting game Tuesday night against Tulane to prepare itself for the gauntlet that is SEC play.

The Green Wave made it one anyways, serving up a reminder that every opponent is a threat to hand a loss. But the Bulldogs flipped that reminder into another one: why it’s important to have a good bullpen.

The Bulldogs beat Tulane 11-7 to finish the pre-SEC games portion of the schedule at 15-2, but this one didn’t feel comfortable for a while.

Tulane pushed its lead to 7-2 midway through the game, and for a stretch the Bulldogs were flirting with the kind of midweek loss that tends to stick with you longer than it should.

What kept it from turning into that kind of night was the bullpen.

Eight different Mississippi State pitchers appeared in the game. It wasn’t always pretty and it definitely wasn’t the original plan, but the collective job was simple: stop the bleeding long enough for the offense to wake up.

Eventually, that’s exactly what happened.

Charlie Foster got the start and lasted 2.1 innings. It wasn’t his best outing, something even coach Brian O’Connor agreed with after the game.

“Charlie Foster in his first inning wasn't great,” O’Connor said. “But then he settled in during the second inning and threw better.”

Tulane scratched out two runs in the first and had more trouble brewing in the third before Jack Gleason came on to escape the jam with two quick outs.

But Gleason ran into problems in the fourth when Tulane jumped back in front with a two-run homer. By the time the middle innings rolled around, the Bulldogs were chasing a five-run deficit and looking for anyone who could give them a clean frame.

That responsibility bounced around the bullpen.

Maddox Miller handled a key stretch in the fifth before Mississippi State had to manage his workload with the weekend approaching. Brendan Sweeney followed, and while the inning got messy with three Tulane runs scoring, the bullpen eventually found its footing.

The most unusual moment of the night belonged to Dane Burns. He threw just four pitches in the top of the seventh. That was it. Four pitches, three outs, and somehow it was enough to earn the win when Mississippi State took the lead moments later.

Baseball has a funny way of working like that sometimes.

Once the Bulldogs moved ahead, the bullpen locked things down. Chris Billingsley delivered a clean eighth inning that took only eight pitches, getting three straight ground balls.

"It felt really good," Billingsley said. "I think after we got the momentum, whatever inning I came in I like to think my team needed me and I knew it was a big spot to shut them down."

Ben Davis handled the ninth, retiring Tulane in order to finish it off.

The final score looked comfortable enough, but the path there wasn’t.

And honestly, that might not be the worst thing heading into SEC play.

Mississippi State would rather avoid games where it needs half the bullpen just to get to the end of a game. But if a night like that shows anything, it’s that the Bulldogs have enough arms to piece it together when things get sideways.

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Taylor Hodges
TAYLOR HODGES

Award-winning sports editor, writer, columnist, and photographer with 15 years’ experience offering his opinion and insight about the sports world in Mississippi and Texas, but he was taken to Razorback pep rallies at Billy Bob's Texas in Fort Worth before he could walk. Taylor has covered all levels of sports, from small high schools in the Mississippi Delta to NFL games. Follow Taylor on Twitter and Facebook.

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