The Mississippi State baseball team overcame a controversial end to Saturday’s game that included a skirmish at the plate to win the series against Georgia on Sunday.
In the eighth inning of Saturday’s matchup, Mississippi State catcher Johnny Long tagged out Georgia baserunner Dillon Carter before standing over him and nudging him back into the ground with his knee. As the umpire separated Long, both benches cleared, and 11 players total were ejected. Georgia went on to win the game 3-2, but that didn’t stop Mississippi State fans from flooding social media with criticism over how many people were ejected.
ICYMI: Last night a play at the plate between Georgia and Mississippi State resulted in players entering the field of play which triggered a 40-minute review and 11 overall ejections.
Those 11 players have not all been named but are expected to miss Sunday’s rubber game as well. pic.twitter.com/fr6SgoNb06
— SEC Baseball (@SECbaseball) April 7, 2024
“Johnny Long should have been ejected and suspended for that crap, but nothing past that. Just handled egregiously by SEC officials in some conference room in Birmingham hundreds of miles away,” one X user wrote on the platform formerly known as Twitter.
“I’ve seen worse altercations on Twitter than what led players to being ejected in this game,” another pitched in.
Officials with the Southeastern Conference (SEC) in Birmingham, Ala., reviewed the film and sided with Mississippi State fans, deciding to only suspend two MSU players and three Georgia players. Per SEC rules, any player who leaves their position to participate in a verbal altercation or physical confrontation is ejected from that game and suspended for one more.
The #SEC announces the reversal of some suspensions and the continuation of others from last night’s game between MSU and Georgia.
MSU will not have Johnny Long/Logan Kohler
UGA will not have Henry Hunter, Fernando Gonzalez or Daniel Padysak pic.twitter.com/L3sZQxh151
— Kendall Rogers (@KendallRogers) April 7, 2024
Even with a slightly depleted roster, Mississippi State took the rubber match behind a big performance at the plate from Bryan Chance. The outfielder drove in the eventual game-winning run in the eighth with a sacrifice fly and finished 2-for-3 at the plate.
Head coach Chris Lemonis opened his Sunday press conference with the following statement on the incident:
“It’s been a crazy 24 hours. You know, I was pretty upset here last night – rightfully so, I think. But it was never about the crew of umpires we had on the field. I thought they were phenomenal. They handled everything in probably the way you should do it. Our league, our AD, everyone who fought – shoot, I was on the phone with Zac Selmon at 3 in the morning and back on it at 6:30 this morning. So, long 24 hours or 12 hours for that matter. I just wanted to make sure I made that statement. It was a weird thing, but the umpires on the field, I just want to make sure that we realize that they were first-class and did an unbelievable job all weekend long.”
Of the other Mississippi teams looking to make it to Omaha, postseason chances for Ole Miss continue to dwindle as the Rebels dropped all three games to top-ranked Arkansas to extend their losing streak to seven. Southern Miss went to Mobile and took two of three from South Alabama to remain in the Sun Belt’s second-place slot.
