OU Baseball: Oklahoma Bashes Its Way to Win Over Mississippi State

The Sooners leveled the series with the Bulldogs with a 13-11 victory on Saturday in Norman.

Oklahoma infielder Dawson Willis / John E. Hoover / Sooners On SI

Oklahoma staved off its first series loss all season as Skip Johnson's team battled back against Mississippi State on Saturday.

With the game tied at 11 in the eighth, Dawson Willis played hero. Kyle Branch reached with a base hit, and Willis homered to deliver the Sooners a 13-11 win at L. Dale Mitchell Park.

With the win OU moved to 19-3 on the year and 3-2 in SEC play while the Bulldogs moved to 15-8 and 2-3 in conference action.

Final Box Score / OU Stats

Making his first SEC start, Cade Crossland worked around a pair of baserunners in the first inning to bring OU's bats to the plate.

After Jason Walk lined out to start the inning, Trey Gambill and Easton Carmichael reached on back-to-back singles.

Jaxon Willits then reached on an error by Sawyer Reeves which allowed Gambill to scamper home from third to take the early 1-0 lead.

An RBI double-by Dayton Tockey drove in Carmichael, then Kyle Branch reached on an error by Mississippi State's Dylan Cupp allowed Willits to come around from third to give the Sooners a 4-0 advantage.

A base hit by Sam Christiansen and a walk to Scott Mudler loaded the bases for Dawson Willis, who delivered another RBI on a fielder's choice that gave Oklahoma a 5-0 lead, but a strikeout by Jason Walk ended the first.

Another pair of errors in the bottom of the second inning put two aboard for OU, where Willits and Branch added another pair of RBIs to push the lead to 6-0.

Mississippi State struck back in the third.

The Bulldogs got on the board via a two-run home run by Ace Reese cut the deficit to 7-2.

A double by Reed Stallman and a single by Bryce Chance continued the rally, pressuring Crossland.

Stallman scored on a wild pitch and Bulldog first basemen Hunter Hines redeemed himself after one of his errors with a wall-scraping home run over to cap off the five-run inning.

Walk helped OU build the lead back up with a sacrifice fly, then a towering two-run home run by Jaxon Willits drove in three more runs gave OU a 10-5 lead at the end of the third.

The fourth inning was where things fell apart for Cade Crossland.

A leadoff double from Cupp and a walk to Sawyer Reeves put two runners on for Reese. He crushed Crossland's final pitch of the game over the wall in left-center make it a 10-8 ballgame.

Michael Catalano then entered the game for the Sooners in place of Crossland.

Mississippi State was only able to muster only one more run in the fourth inning off an RBI-groundout by Bryce Chance, leaving the Sooners clinging onto a 10-9 lead.

Reeves' RBI-single tied the game at 10 for Mississippi State in the fifth.

The Bulldogs took their first lead of the afternoon courtesy of Noah Sullivan's RBI-single in the seventh.

Willis put the OU offense in a position to strike back with a one-out single in the bottom of the seventh. Four batters later, Carmichael drove Willis home to send the game into the eighth level at 11.

With two runners on and two outs in the eighth, Johnson again went to the pen to bring in OU closer Dylan Crooks. 

The move immediately paid dividends as Crooks struck out Joe Powell to keep the game tied into the bottom of the eighth. 

Branch picked an excellent time for his first hit of the day as he lined one into center field to put the go-ahead run on base. Branch stole second, then moved up 90 feet on a wild pitch with Willis up stepping up to the plate.

Willis connected on the second pitch he saw, hammering the ball into the berm in left field to put OU up 13-11 headed into the ninth.

Crooks close out the win with strikeout and a couple of fly outs to even the series up.

Oklahoma and Mississippi State will return to action in Game 3 of the series on Saturday at 2:00 p.m.