No. 17 Mississippi State Begins SEC Tournament Wednesday

ATHENS, Ga. – No. 17 Mississippi State will meet a new SEC foe to open the SEC Tournament at 10 a.m. CT on Wednesday. The Bulldogs are slated to face No. 10/9 LSU, which earned the No. 9 seed in the conference tournament.

State (37-16, 13-11 SEC) earned the No. 8 seed after finishing above .500 in conference play for the first time since 2001. The Bulldogs won five series, for the first time since 2007, and they posted back-to-back seasons with at least a .500 record in conference for the first time since 1998-99.

Mississippi State has won 37 games this year, already matching their highest total under head coach Samantha Ricketts. Ricketts also broke the program record for ranked wins by a head coach in the final weekend of the regular season with her 45th. Of those, 25 have come in the last two seasons alone.

The Bulldogs will open the tournament's Wednesday schedule. The last time that State and LSU were the first game of the day was in 2022 in Gainesville, Florida, when the Bulldogs' outlasted the Tigers in a nine-inning contest. The following day, MSU set a then-SEC Tournament record with a 13-inning contest against Tennessee.

Game Coverage

Leading Off

Historic Sec Season: Mississippi State finished above .500 in conference play (13-11) for the first time since 2001 (19-11). The 13 wins are State's highest total since going 13-14 in 2008, and MSU won five series for the first time since 2007. Along with last year (12-12), the Bulldogs have their first back-to-back years with at least a .500 record since 1998-99.

Golden Girls: Sierra Sacco and Raelin Chaffin were both drafted by the Talons in the AUSL College Draft. They are State's 14th and 15th draft picks, and MSU is one of two teams nationally with multiple draftees.

Ricketts' Record Year: MSU has already matched Samantha Ricketts' highest win total in a season with 37 victories. MSU's team slugging percentage (.548) and on-base percentage (.415) would be single-season school records, and its batting average (.317) would rank second in program history.

Taking Down Top Teams: Samantha Ricketts boasts a school-record 45 victories against NFCA-ranked opponents in her coaching career. The Bulldogs had just 101 ranked wins prior to her tenure. State has 25 ranked wins in the past two years alone.

Regional Hosting Resume: Mississippi State's 11 wins over RPI Top 25 teams are tied for the eighth-most in the nation. Ten of those were against teams that currently have a better RPI than MSU. The Bulldogs boast a top-25 strength of schedule and have played three different teams that were No. 1 in at least one poll at some point this season.

Fifty-Fifty: With one stolen base the Bulldogs will complete their first 50 homer-50 stolen base season since 2018. State has accomplished that feat two other times in 2015 and 2013 as well. MSU also currently has 72 homers, which is one shy of the program's single-season record.

Quick Start: The Bulldogs are 23-5 when they score in the first inning this year. Sierra Sacco has led off the game with a homer four times this year, including three times on the first pitch a Bulldog batter has seen.

Keep It Clean: MSU's .970 team fielding percentage is its highest since 2014 (.976). Two starters remain errorless. Jessie Blaine has gone 232 consecutive chances without an error, which is the sixth-longest streak in school history, and Sierra Sacco has not made an error since 2023.

SEC Tournament History

Overall: 15-30 | First Game: 7-15 | vs. Ranked Teams: 4-21 | In Athens: 0-0
In Extra Innings: 1-4 | One-Run Games: 6-10
By Opponent: Alabama, 1-7; Arkansas, 1-2; Auburn, 1-1; Florida, 3-2; Georgia, 1-3; Kentucky, 0-1; LSU, 1-2; Missouri, 0-2; Oklahoma, 0-0; Ole Miss, 1-2; South Carolina, 3-5; Tennessee, 1-3; Texas, 0-0; Texas A&M, 2-0

Tournament Notables

State has won at least one SEC Tournament game twice under Samantha Ricketts and in four of the last six tournaments. State has only won multiple games in the tournament twice (1999 and 1998) and those came during the double-elimination era. The last time MSU and LSU met in the tournament came in 2022 with State claiming a 7-4 win in nine innings. The following day Mississippi State and No. 13 Tennessee played the then-longest game in tournament history, going 13 innings in an eventual 1-0 win for the Lady Vols. Both games were the first of the day and delayed the remainder of the tournament significantly.

On Deck

The NCAA Selection Show is Sunday, May 11 at 6 p.m. CT on ESPN2.

Follow the Bulldogs

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No. 17 Mississippi State Begins SEC Tournament Wednesday

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Jessie Blaine

Raelin Chaffin

Sierra Sacco

Mississippi State University Athletics

No. 17 Mississippi State Begins SEC Tournament Wednesday

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Jessie Blaine

Raelin Chaffin

Sierra Sacco

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