Texas A&M Baseball: Aggies edged at home by Mississippi State
By Tim England
Costly fielding mistakes and untimely hitting ultimately doomed Texas A&M baseball as the Mississippi State Bulldogs took two of three in College Station.
After a promising start to the series, the No. 17 Texas A&M Aggies (34-15, 14-10) dropped the next two games and the series to the No. 13 Mississippi St Bulldogs (32-17, 16-8). The Aggies came into this series having won the previous five SEC series in a row but let the Bulldogs hang around too long.
There was a lot to like over this weekend from Blake Koptesky‘s performance at the plate and Stephen Kolek‘s Sunday outing on the mound. But unexpected errors by Braden Shewmake and a particularly bad collapse by Mitchell Kilkenny really hurt the Aggies.
Game 1: Texas A&M defeats Mississippi St 9-2
Texas A&M defeated Mississippi St 9-2 Thursday night in front of a rowdy home crowd of 4,417. The 12th Man hit a record #Ball12 chant in the bottom of the 4th inning capped off by a grand slam #Whammy to right field by Braden Shewmake. Nick Choruby also had a fine game at the plane, going 3-for-4 with 2 RBI and a run scored.
The star of the night was the Aggie ace, Brigham Hill. Hill had another phenomenal outing, pitching seven innings, giving up two runs on two hits and striking out six. Hill picked up his 7th win of the year and continued to look the part of a dominant SEC ace. Kaylor Chaffin and Jason Ruffcorn each pitched an inning in relief and were phenomenal, retiring every batter they faced.