Mizzou baseball’s recent struggles continued Friday evening with a 5-0 loss against No. 24 Arkansas. The defeat clinches a third straight series loss in Southeastern Conference play and leaves the Tigers without an SEC win at home since their 12-11 victory over Auburn in May. 10 2024.
The Tigers will have one more chance to earn their first victory against Arkansas since Mar. 26, 2022, on Sunday at 2:00 P.M CT and avoid the sweep in this year’s edition of the Battle Line rivalry.
In that game, the Tigers accumulated 13 hits, including two RBI singles, an RBI double, and a solo homer from their lineup. The bats in the order on Friday weren’t able to provide this level of execution or production. Two hits, three walks, and five strikeouts were all that Missouri had to show for against Razorbacks starter Cole Gibler and reliever Steel Eaves.
‘We do meetings, and we talk about what the pitchers’ arsenal is and how they’re going to be pitched,” Jackson said. “Our guys are armed with a ton of information. But for whatever reason, there are times where we get into the box, and we have a bunch of anxiety, and we forget the things we’ve talked about, so just being mindful of that and telling them to execute when it comes to the offensive strategy.”
Mizzou and the Razorbacks couldn’t find anything to separate them for the opening three innings, as Gibler and Tigers starter Brady Kehlenbrink were both putting up zeros. No runners left on base, seven strikeouts, and no hits were surrendered by Kehlenbrink as he cruised through his opening three innings of work.
Well, except for Kaden Peer providing Tigers fans with some extravagance in the outfield. For the third time this season, Peer took away a home run from the opposing side. The robbery victim this time was Maikia Niu, who had connected on a 1-0 pitch to deep center field.
Despite getting into three-ball counts in the opening inning, Kehlenbrink struck out the side, and by the third, he began to attack the zone with more aggression, while maintaining the accuracy, mowing down three more Razorbacks by the way of the strikeout.
Arkansas broke the deadlock in the fourth inning in a big way. Cam Kozeal was second in the home run category on the Razorbacks coming into the series. He made his mark with a two-run shot off of Kehlenbrink that a jumping Pierre Seals couldn’t provide Tigers fans another SportsCenter Top 10 moment.
The rockiness of the outing began for Kehlenbrink in the sixth, after a pair of singles by the two-headed monster of the Razorbacks lineup, Kozeal and Ryder Helfrick. Eli Skidmore took the reins and immediately ran into trouble, surrendering an RBI double to Niu, who ended up getting his RBI anyhow.
After issuing a free pass to Nolan Souza, Zack Stewart extended the Arkansas lead to four on his shallow single into center field. After retiring the next batter, another walk by Skidmore led to his replacement. Left-handed reliever Isaiah Salas closed the inning, as Carter Rutenbar grounded out to short to conclude the productive three-run sixth for the Razorbacks.
Salas pitched through the eighth, and following an error at second base by Blaize Ward on a ground ball to open the inning, Nolan Souza found himself on base and took full advantage, stealing second immediately after. A groundout that moved Souza to third base, followed up by an RBI single from Reese Robinett.
QUIET NIGHT FOR MISSOURI OFFENSE
You might have just read through that debriefing and thought to yourself, “Where was the mention of the Tigers’ offense?” That offense, as described earlier, earned two hits, coming from outfielders Donovan Jordan and Pierre Seals, and left a total of four runners on base.
Cole Gibler earned his season-high in innings pitched against the Tigers, an offense that has proven itself to be explosive and timely at certain points in the season. It hasn’t shown those colors enough throughout the course of their latest nine-game losing streak, four of those occasions scoring three runs or less.
In Missouri’s 5-4 defeat to Arkansas on Thursday, there were brief moments from Jase Woita and Blaize Ward, a pair of homers that gave a spark from plate appearances. The candle was very much snuffed out in Friday’s at-bats for the Tigers.
“We’re allergic to offense and executing two-strike pitches,” Missouri coach Kerrick Jackson said. That’s ultimately what today’s game came down to…There’s a pride aspect of it where you can’t keep going up and doing the same things and expecting it to be different. Hitting is hard, and I think our guys are chasing hits and not quality at-bats.”
PITCHING STAFF FEELING EFFECTS OF PLATE STRUGGLES
As the outs continued to pile up, fellow MU baseball writer Amber Winkler and I looked through the previous games where the Missouri offense had faltered in a quality outing.
To her credit, Amber had found that in two of Mizzou’s four shutout losses, Brady Kehlenbrink has been on the mound. Now, following this defeat, it’s been five shutout losses, three Kehlenbrink outings.
The Tigers had also scored fewer than three runs in five of their outings, and each of these has now increased by one, respectively, following the 6-0 defeat on Friday. Jackson had this to say post-game on those pair of statistics.
“I think it’s tough for anybody,” Jackson said. “In one of those shutouts we lost 1-0, I think anytime you’re not scoring, and you’re going out and putting your team in a position to win, you want to be in a better position when it comes to that. So I’m sure there’s frustration on his part, but he’s no more frustrated than we are.”
UP NEXT
Missouri will look to avoid the sweep in the series finale at 2:00 P.M. Saturday. Claiming a victory in the Battle Line rivalry and breaking its recent losing streak is what the Tigers will be looking for to turn their fortunes.
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