Ole Miss’ bats stay quiet in loss to Texas Tech

Published 3:05 pm Saturday, March 4, 2017

Ole Miss’ offense continued to struggle Saturday.

The eighth-ranked Rebels were silenced again in a 5-1 loss to No. 24 Texas Tech in their second game of the Shriners Hospitals for Children College Classic at Minute Maid Park in Houston. Ole Miss, which has lost three straight, has nine hits in the tournament after being shut out by Baylor on Friday and has scored just three runs in its last 25 innings.

Ole Miss will wrap up its stiff tournament slate Sunday against No. 1 TCU at 1:30 p.m.

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Ole Miss (7-3) was down 5-0 in the bottom of the eighth before Ryan Olenek followed Tate Blackman’s double with one of his own, snapping the Rebels’ streak of 17 consecutive scoreless innings. Olenek (2-for-4) was the only Ole Miss player with multiple hits.

The Rebels couldn’t get much of anything going against Tech’s Steven Gingery (3-0), the reigning Big 12 Pitcher of the Week. The left-hander scattered five hits over eight innings while walking two and striking out eight to remain unbeaten on the season. Ole Miss got a walk and two hits against Jose Quezada in the ninth, but Quezada got Thomas Dillard to roll into a double play to kill any potential rally.

Ole Miss right-hander James McArthur (0-1) yielded two hits and three walks while fanning five as he limited Tech (10-2) to one run over the first five frames, but a pair of errors moved two Tech baserunners into scoring position in the sixth and ended McArthur’s day. McArthur was charged with three runs — all unearned — after Tanner Garner’s single off freshman Ryan Rolison plated both runs.

Rolison allowed two earned runs on four hits while punching out six in 2 2/3 innings of relief. Fellow freshman Houston Roth retired all four batters he faced over the final 1 1/3 innings.