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The University of Mississippi Athletics
Ole Miss
Florida
Rebels Bounced From SEC Tournament By Gators
5/22/2009 | Baseball
HOOVER, Ala. - The Rebel offense never got on track Thursday as No. 7 Ole Miss (40-17) fell to No. 9 Florida (39-19) by a score of 12-2 in eight innings in an elimination game in the Southeastern Conference Tournament at Regions Park.
Ole Miss was out-hit in the game 15-to-7 as the Rebels were unable to get an extra-base hit in the game. The loss marked the first loss to Florida in an elimination game under head coach Mike Bianco. The Rebels and Gators had faced-off in elimination games three times prior and Ole Miss was 3-0 in those games.
Brett Bukvich (9-3) suffered the loss for the Rebels as he allowed five runs on five hits with a walk and seven strikeouts in 4.0 innings of work.
Anthony DeSclafani (6-3) picked up the win for the Gators as he worked 5.2 innings and held the Rebels to two runs on five hits with a walk and three strikeouts.
"Obviously we're disappointed," said Ole Miss head coach Mike Bianco. "I thought today had a lot to do with the way Florida played, unlike yesterday when we could have done some things differently. Florida made us pay on bad pitches and threw the ball well themselves."
Florida jumped out of the gates early, using a home run from Justin Pigott to push to a 1-0 lead in the first.
Ole Miss answered in the bottom half of the frame when Jordan Henry scored from third on a groundout to third from Kyle Henson. Henry singled to open the inning and stole second before moving to third on a groundout to short from Logan Power to set up the score on the Henson grounder and tie the game at one.
The Gators evened the game in the fourth with a solo home run from Preston Tucker that hit the foul pole and knotted the game at two.
Florida broke the game open in the fifth, capitalizing on Ole Miss miscues to push out to a big lead. Back-to-back singles from Buddy Munroe and Mike Mooney put two men on before a throwing error on a pick-off attempt at second allowed both runners to get into scoring position. Avery Barnes then singled to left to drive both runners home and push Florida out to a 4-2 lead.
Ole Miss then turned to its bullpen for freshman right-hander David Goforth. Goforth got Barnes to fly out, but Tucker came up with a two-RBI double to right field to score Barnes and extend the lead to 5-2.
Florida then used another home run from Pigott - a three-run shot with two outs - to push the lead to 8-2 in favor of the Gators in the sixth inning.
The Gators added two more runs with a two-out bleeder to center field that pushed the lead to 10-2. Florida then added another run in the eighth to extend the lead to 11-2.
Ole Miss will now return home and await NCAA Regional host site announcements on the ESPN family of networks at 2:30 p.m. on Sunday. The NCAA Tournament field will be announced at 11:30 a.m. on Monday on ESPN.
