Little Rock Travels To Ninth-Ranked Ole Miss Wednesday

Little Rock at Ole Miss
Location	Oxford, Miss.
Stadium	Swayze Field
First Pitch	Wednesday, March 7 - 6:30 p.m.
Records	Little Rock (6-6) Ole Miss (11-1)
Watch	WatchESPN
Stats	TrojanStats.com
Rebel Preview	OleMissSports.com

LITTLE ROCK – Little Rock travels to Oxford, Miss. to take on 9th-ranked Ole Miss for a midweek game on Wednesday beginning at 6:30 p.m. at Swayze Field. The game against the Rebels will be broadcast live on SEC Network +.
 
TROJANS TO WATCH FOR
Sophomore catcher Kale Emshoff leads the team in hitting on the year with a .425 batting average. He also leads the team in walks with 10 and has five doubles on the year — three of them coming in the previous game versus Northwestern State.
 
Junior Riley Pittman broke his slump this last weekend versus Northwestern State going 7-for-12 at the plate with three RBIs and a home run.
 
Junior Troy Alexander is hitting .380 with seven multi-hit games. He has driven in 14 runs through 12 games with 19 hits as his power has been an anchor for the Trojans in the four spot. He has hit four home runs on the year as well as six doubles.
 
Right-handed reliever Justin Garcia has been the strikeout master so far on the season for the Trojans. In 13.1 innings pitched he has recorded 25 strike­outs and his strikeout per nine innings sits at 16.68, which ranks tied for 6th nationally.
 
SCOUTING OLE MISS
The Rebels (11-1) have had a favorable schedule to begin the year, playing 13 of their first 16 games at home includ­ing the first eight of the season. They went 8-0 during that stretch, sweeping Winthrop and Tulane in three game series before beating Murray State and Memphis in midweek matchups. They then traveled to Long Beach State where they suffered their first loss of the season but still won the series 2-1 before returning home to defeat Austin Peay 11-4 Tuesday.
 
Their success is driven behind a dominant pitching staff that is a throwing a combined ERA of 2.30, which ranks 18th in the nation. Three starters for the Rebels are throwing under a 2.20 ERA.
 
The Rebels will be throwing their freshman left-hander, Jordan Fowler, the first start of his collegiate career. He has seen limited action this year only throwing three and a third innings but is 2-0 from those innings. He has made three appearances all year and has a 2.70 ERA. He has given up two hits while striking out four and walking one.
 
Ole Miss has five starters hitting over .300 and as a team are hitting .296 which ranks 46th nationally. The Reb­els also have seven different players with a home run on the year so far.
 
SERIES AGAINST OLE MISS
The Trojans have gone 5-16 all-time against the Rebels. In the outing last March, Little Rock fell 4-5 to the then ranked #19 Rebels in extra-innings. Since 2000 the Trojans are 3-8 while five of those matchups were when Ole Miss was ranked in the top-15. The last time the Trojans beat a ranked Ole Miss was in 2010 when Little Rock won 9-6 in Oxford against the 15th-ranked Rebels.
 
LAST TIME OUT
Little Rock had a tough matchup against Northwestern State over the weekend dropping two of three in the weekend series. Game one was a back and forth battle where the Trojans lost 6-5 after giving up late game lead. Game two was another close contest that took 13 innings to separate the two before Northwestern State rallied off four runs in the 13th to take the 7-3 victory. Little Rock jumped out to a quick 3-0 lead in game three from back-to-back home runs from Riley Pittman and Matt Merino in the first inning and never looked back, avoiding the sweep with a 5-2 win in the series finale.
 
ON DECK
Following the midweek game against the ranked Rebels, the Trojans will travel to Memphis, Tenn. to take on the Memphis Tigers for a three-game weekend series at FedEx Park. Game one is Friday, March 9 at 6:30 p.m. followed by a game on Satur­day at 2 p.m. and capping off on Sunday at 1 p.m.

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