Eighth-Ranked Bulldogs Tangle With Rebels In 27th Mayor's Trophy Game
May 25, 2016 | Baseball
STARKVILLE, Miss. - Mississippi State (25-6) travels to Jackson, Miss., Tuesday, opening a six-game road run with a neutral site meeting with in-state SEC rival Mississippi (19-13) in the 27th annual Mayor's Trophy Game. A capacity crowd is anticipated for the 6:30 p.m. game at Smith-Wills Stadium where MSU is this year's designated home team.
The radio broadcast of the game will be carried on the statewide MSU Baseball Radio Network with live video streaming available on "Maroon to the Max", the premium extension of the official MSU Athletic Department web site (www.MStateAthletics.com).
The Bulldogs maintained their top 10 status in this week's national polls. State is eighth in the NCBWA writers poll, ninth in this week's USA TODAY/ESPN coaches poll and 10th in both the Baseball America magazine and the Collegiate Baseball newspaper rankings. It's State's seventh consecutive week with a top 10 national ranking.
Freshman right-hander Matt Lea (5-0, 2.40) will draw his sixth start of the campaign in Tuesday's meeting the with Rebels, who will counter with sophomore righty Will Kline (0-2, 3.86).
MSU senior shortstop Thomas Berkery opens the week with an SEC-leading .424 batting average and riding a school-record 28-game hitting streak. The Sarasota, Fla., native broke Ron Brown's 27-game hitting streak record from 1993 with a single in his third plate appearance Sunday against Georgia. Berkery has hits in 30 of Mississippi State's 31 games, is tied for second in the SEC with 50 hits, paces MSU with 24 walks and leads the conference with a .510 on-base percentage.
The Bulldogs are hitting at an SEC-leading .315 clip, rank second in the league with a 2.97 staff earned run average, and rank seventh with a .965 fielding percentage.
Mississippi notched a 5-1 win in last year's Mayor's Trophy Game and with six wins in the last seven MTG meetings has pulled even in the neutral site series at 13-13. MSU won the last 2005 meeting with UM, posting a 4-1 win in the championship game of the SEC Baseball Tournament in Hoover, Ala.
The inaugural Mayor's Trophy Game was held April 22, 1980 after the series was created by MSU skipper Ron Polk, former UM head coach Jake Gibbs and former Jackson Mayor Dale Danks. The series has averaged more than 4,900 fans over its 26-year run.
State resumes SEC competition this weekend with a three-game series at Auburn and visits Memphis next week for a pair of midweek games before returning to Dudy Noble Field to host the Arkansas Razorbacks.
