Missouri Tigers Baseball Set For Series With Ole Miss

If you’re a fan of first time things, you’ll like what Missouri Tigers baseball is rolling out this weekend: a three game series with Ole Miss. It will be the first time ever that the Rebels will every pay a visit to Columbia.

The No. 21 Tigers are in a slump reminisent of days of old, after dropping five consecutive games, but the Tigers have lots of reasons to be confident that they can turn things back around this weekend.

Before going on a week-long tail spin, Mizzou had a 26-15 record and had an opportunity to hold on to a first place SEC East lead before falling apart on the road at Vanderbilt last week, in a set that forced Mizzou out of the Top 15 rankings in the country and eventually slotted them at No. 3 spot in the division. Mizzou’s slide is troubling, but certainly isn’t a sure sign of things to come.

Ole Miss comes into the weekend on a three-game winning streak of its own. It hits well, but has a habit of giving up runs.

Despite the Rebels’ recent success, they still arrive as a clear opportunity for the Missouri Tigers to overcome their struggles. Ole Miss is an under-.500 ball club in SEC play and they’ve been shown to have trouble with slugging teams. Mizzou would benefit from having their big bats reawaken. With John Lestor, Brett Bond, Trey Harris and Ryan Howard having much success this year at the plate, the Tigers could take advantage of Ole Miss’ ability to put runners on base. A big home or two in each game for Mizzou would have series-winning implications for Missouri.

Here are the starting pithcers for the Tigers:

FRIDAY: Reggie McClain

SATURDAY: Tanner HouckSUNDAY: Peter Fairbanks

First pitch is Friday at 6 p.m. at Taylor field, with 2 p.m. Saturday game and a 3 p.m. Sunday start. Ole Miss, believe it or not, leads the all time series 7-5.