OXFORD, Mississippi – The University of Iowa baseball team dropped the rubber match of a three-game series to Ole Miss, 8-3, on Sunday afternoon at Swayze field.
Iowa outhit Ole Miss 7-5 but fell behind 5-0 after five innings, and 8-0 after seven innings. The Hawkeyes scored three runs in the eighth inning but couldn’t mount a comeback.
“The game started off like it was going to a low scoring pitchers dual,” said head coach Rick Heller. “We had some opportunities offensively, had bases loaded early with no outs and ran into some bad luck. Had the chopper and they got the force at the plate, and then Seegers smoked a ball right at the third baseman to double us off. That is how the day went for us offensively.”
Cade Obermueller started on the bump for the Hawkeyes. He threw four innings and allowed four runs on two hits while walking five and striking out four.
Zach Voelker threw two innings and allowed one run, and Gannon Archer threw 2/3 of an inning allowing two runs. Brant Hogue, Jack Young and Drew Deremer closed out the final 1 1/3 innings for the Hawkeyes without allowing a hit.
“Our top four hitters in the lineup didn’t have a hit today,” said Heller. “Then we went back to giving free bases. It wasn’t a day when Ole Miss was tearing the cover off the ball. You look at the scoreboard we lost, 8-3, but outhit them, 7-5, we pretty much gave them all the runs except the solo home run.
Andy Nelson had a three-hit day for Iowa going 3-for-4 and Reese Moore was 2-for-4 with a double and an RBI. Kyle Huckstorf had a two-run blast to chip away at the Rebel lead.
“It is disappointing,” said Heller. “We can’t get out of our own way, and we are our own worst enemy right now. I liked the way we fought back in the eighth and kept playing. Huck hits that home run and it should have been 3-3 or 3-2 us if we go out and limit the free bases. I was happy that we kept playing. We need to clean it up, period. Simple as that.”