The Good, Bad and Ugly From Texas Baseball’s Series Win Over Ole Miss

No. 2 Texas baseball clinched its first SEC series of the season.

The Texas Longhorns baseball team sings the school song prior to the series opener against the Ole Miss Rebels. | University of Texas Athletic

It wasn’t always pretty, but No. 2 Texas got the job done.

After suffering its first loss of the season in dramatic fashion Friday night, the Longhorns responded by winning the final two games to take the weekend series from Ole Miss to improve to 18-1 on the season.

While Texas failed to remain undefeated and secure its best start in 21 years, the series still served as a promising showing in its first Southeastern Conference matchup against a solid Ole Miss team.

Here’s everything good, bad and ugly from the weekend.

The Good -- Starting Pitching Dominance

Texas sophomore pitcher Dylan Volantis tosses a pitch at UFCU Disch-Falk Field in Austin, Texas. | Texas Athletics

After Friday’s complete bullpen meltdown, Texas’ starting rotation responded resoundingly with two of its best performances of the season.

Fifth-year left-hander Luke Harrison steadied the staff Saturday, tossing seven innings and 102 pitches — both career highs — while allowing just two unearned runs in an 11–2 victory.

His performance helped reset a bullpen that had been stretched thin the night before. 

Then on Sunday, sophomore Dylan Volantis followed with a spectacular outing of his own.

Volantis struck out a career-high 11 Rebels while allowing just one run across six innings, repeatedly pitching out of traffic while keeping Ole Miss off balance.

After an atrocious Friday night, the pair of southpaws delivered two masterful performances, showing the kind of stuff Texas expected from its starting rotation entering the season.

The Bad -- Ole Miss’ Quiet Bats

Ole Mississippi Rebels' Brayden Randle swings against the Southern Miss Golden Eagles. | Lauren Witte/Clarion Ledger / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Outside of Friday’s ninth-inning rally, Ole Miss remained fairly stagnant for most of the weekend and had difficulty generating any sustained offense against Texas’ pitching staff.

Across Saturday and Sunday, Ole Miss managed just four total runs over 18 innings while frequently striking out and leaving runners stranded on base.

On Sunday alone, the Rebels stranded eight runners and were 3-for-13 with runners in scoring position. 

Ole Miss was basically helpless against Volantis, who racked up 11 strikeouts and limited the Rebels to scattered hits across six innings.

Even when Ole Miss managed to put runners on base, Texas pitchers repeatedly worked out of trouble, preventing the kind of big innings that defined Friday’s comeback.

The Ugly -- Friday’s Ninth-Inning Collapse

This wasn’t a hard one. Friday night’s collapse for the Longhorns was pretty inexcusable and, well, ugly. 

Texas carried a three-run lead into the ninth inning before the bullpen completely unraveled. Walks and hit batters loaded the bases for Ole Miss cleanup hitter Tristan Bissetta. 

Then came the decisive blow. Bisettal launched a mammoth grand slam in the ninth inning that completely flipped the game and stunned the Disch crowd. 

Texas eventually fell 9–8 in extra innings after using seven pitchers in the loss. 

It was utterly poor management from head coach Jim Schlossnagle and a heartbreaking result from a bullpen that had been one of the team’s biggest strengths all season.