Ole Miss baseball swept in doubleheader by Florida, still winless in SEC play
Around this time in 1996, the last time Ole Miss baseball dropped its first five SEC games, the likes of Mariah Carey, Boyz II Men and Celine Dion.
After Florida swept the Rebels in a doubleheader Saturday at Swayze Field, Ole Miss is once again staring at an 0-5 start to its conference campaign.
The defending national champions let a late lead slip in a 9-7 defeat to start the day, then saw themselves fall behind by six runs early in a 12-8 loss to cap off the action.
Florida first baseman Jac Caglianone tormented the Rebels all day, finishing 5-for-8 at the plate with three home runs on another troubling day for the Ole Miss pitching staff.
The Rebels have now allowed 48 runs in their five conference games so far after Vanderbilt touched them up for 27 across three contests.
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Rebels blow Game 1 lead
Ole Miss' first three SEC losses last weekend to Vanderbilt were lopsided and ugly.
The game the Rebels (15-8, 0-5 SEC) dropped to open their series against Florida (21-4, 4-1) on Saturday was just as brutal, but for a different reason.
Ole Miss carried a 6-3 lead into the eighth inning, where typically reliable reliever Mason Nichols fell apart, allowing four runs across 0.2 innings.
Nichols had a chance to escape the danger after Josh Rivera drilled a solo home run to trim the Ole Miss lead down to two runs. But, with the bases loaded, Cade Kurland drilled a Nichols fastball into the right-center field gap that scored three runs and turned a 6-4 Ole Miss lead into a 7-6 deficit.
After Michael Robertson robbed Ethan Lege of a home run that would have tied the game in the bottom of the eighth, Florida tacked on two key insurance runs in the top of the ninth.
With the tying run on second base in the bottom half of the frame, TJ McCants struck out to end the game.
Jack Dougherty started for Ole Miss and allowed three earned runs over 4.2 innings, giving up five hits and walking two while striking out five.
Rebels can't rebound in Game 2 loss
In the second game of the doubleheader, Florida touched up freshman Ole Miss starter Grayson Saunier for five runs by the time he exited the game without recording an out in the third inning. They added another against his replacement, JT Quinn, too.
The Rebels rallied the Gators' Hurston Waldrep – who they'd beaten while he was with Southern Miss on their way to Omaha last season. They got within a run thanks in part to RBI doubles from Groff and Kemp Alderman in the third inning, but never knotted the score.
Quinn surrendered three more runs ‒ one of which was unearned ‒ in the middle innings, and Florida notched another three against Jordan Vera in the ninth, rendering Alderman's two-run shot in the bottom of the frame moot.
Up next
Ole Miss and Florida will play the final game of their series on Sunday (2 p.m., SEC Network).
David Eckert covers Ole Miss for the Clarion Ledger. Email him at deckert@gannett.com or reach him on Twitter @davideckert98.
This article originally appeared on Mississippi Clarion Ledger: Ole Miss baseball swept in doubleheader by Florida, still winless in SEC
