The Mississippi State baseball squad returns to Dudy Noble Field this weekend as it hosts Kansas and Mississippi Valley State in a three-team round-robin series.
Fresh off their series win over Washington State last weekend, the Bulldogs are back in action and ready to keep the momentum. Junior college transfer Trey Porter, who collected six hits in 10 plate appearances including two home runs last weekend, said he is looking forward to a new series.
“Just getting (last week) out of the way and getting down to playing baseball is what it’s all about,” he said. “If we play our game and we do what we have to do we’ll win. We know our offense can put up enough runs for our pitching to hold them.”
MSU’s pitching staff had a strong outing against Washington State as it allowed just 23 hits while striking out 34 batters. The rotation for this series will be similar to last weekend’s games, head coach John Cohen said, with a few more pitchers seeing action on the mound.
 ”I think our kids will be paired up kind of the way they were last weekend,” he said. “We’re going to have to add some people to the mix, but certainly in a four-game set you’re going to have to pitch a lot of guys.”
Ben Bracewell, who made his first career start for the Maroon and White last weekend, is Friday’s probable starter with Chris Stratton filling a relief role. Nick Routt and Kendall Graveman also earned starting spots last weekend as Luis Pollorena, Evan Mitchell, Taylor Stark and Caleb Reed threw multiple innings in relief.
Newcomers Brandon Woodruff and Will Cox are competing for a starting role for Sunday’s game with the others coming out of the bullpen, according to Cohen. Bracewell, a sophomore, said he is confident about his staff and looks forward to this weekend.
“I would expect to continue to see a lot of what you saw this past weekend,” he said. “Our whole staff is a really competitive group and I like what we’ve seen so far.”
Kansas comes into Starkville with a 3-0 record as the Jayhawks swept the Music City Classic by defeating Middle Tennessee State, Bowling Green and Belmont last weekend.
Mississippi Valley State is in search of its first victory of the season as the Delta Devils dropped two games last weekend to Florida A&M and Eastern Illinois in a tournament hosted by Jackson State.
The Bulldogs open up the weekend with Kansas on Friday at 6:30 p.m. Saturday features a doubleheader as MSU begins with Mississippi Valley State at noon followed by Kansas at 4 p.m. Sunday’s finale against MVSU starts at 4 p.m.