Southeast Missouri State baseball gets 4 seed, to play in Starkville NCAA regional

Garrett Gandolfo admitted he didn’t roll out of bed until about 10:35 Monday morning, not leaving a lot of time for the Southeast Missouri State senior first baseman to get to Wings, Etc. in Cape Girardeau to watch the selection show for the NCAA regionals.

Who could blame him for wanting to get a little rest?

Southeast had just finished playing four games in a span of about 24 hours to win its first Ohio Valley Conference tournament title since 2002 and secure that regional berth on Sunday night.

Less than 16 hours after recording the final out to defeat Jacksonville State 14-8, Southeast learned that it would be headed to Starkville, Mississippi, for its first regional appearance in 14 years.

“I feel really excited, happy and just ready to play baseball,” Gandolfo said. “... Just got done and I’m ready to go again.”

The Southeast Missouri State baseball team looks on as it learns its NCAA Regional fate during a watch party at Wings, Etc. in Cape Girardeau on Monday. The Redhawks will be traveling to Starkville, Mississippi, to take on Mississippi State.Fred Lynch ~ flynch@semissourian.com

The adrenaline was still pumping for most of the Redhawks during the watch party.

“We’re riding a high right now so if we had to go out there and play right now I’d be able to,” center fielder Dan Holst said.

It’s been a whirlwind for the OVC regular-season and tournament champion Redhawks, who will enter their regional as the No. 4 seed with a record of 39-19.

They’ll face host Mississippi State, the No. 6 national seed, at 1:30 p.m. Friday at Dudy Noble Field.

“The games seemed liked they were going so slow and then all of a sudden when you put it all in perspective the weekend just seemed like it flew by,” Southeast coach Steve Bieser said. “Getting here today and finding out where we’re going, it’s just a true joy and an exciting feeling to know that we’re going to a regional, know that we’re going into a hostile environment in Mississippi State. Our team feeds off energy and I think that there’s definitely going to be a lot of energy there. It’s just going to be a really fun experience.”

Bieser was pleased with where his team landed in the field of 64 even though most of the team thought it was headed for a regional at Vanderbilt, Ole Miss or Louisiana-Lafayette.

Gandolfo was excited he’d get to experience a new stadium, noting that while Ole Miss would’ve been nice, the team already played there earlier this season.

Starkville won’t be new to some Redhawks, though. Senior shortstop Branden Boggetto and other members of the 2014 team lost 3-2 to the Bulldogs in a midweek game two years ago. MSU went 39-24 and 18-12 in the SEC that season.

“We went down there two years ago and we played pretty well against them,” Boggetto said. “I think we’re going to go down there and we’re going to lay it all on the line and play as well as we can.”

The Redhawks and Southeastern Conference champion Bulldogs (41-16-1) are joined by No. 2 Cal State Fullerton (35-21) of the Big West Conference and No. 3 Louisiana Tech (40-18) of Conference USA.

Those two teams will face off in the double-elimination regional that runs through Sunday at 1:30 p.m. Friday.

Both games will be broadcast on ESPN3.

“We knew that Game 1 is going to be extremely tough no matter what we drew, but I do feel that it’s a game that we can go in and represent ourselves very well and be very competitive, and the expectation is to go in and win a ballgame,” Bieser said. “That’s what we’re looking at and I think we match up OK, and I think that they feel the same way — that it’s going to be a ballgame.

“It’s going to be interesting to see what pitcher they lead off with and we also have some decisions to make on our end as well, just the fact that with Joey [Lucchesi] throwing on Sunday he’s throwing on shorter rest and [we’ll have to decide] how we want to do that.”

Two-time OVC Pitcher of the Year Joey Lucchesi pitched a complete-game shutout versus Morehead State on Friday and then recorded a three-inning save in the championship game versus JSU on Sunday night, throwing 154 pitches in the tournament.

Southeast junior transfer Chris Caffrey is quite familiar with MSU’s ace, junior righty Dakota Hudson. The two played on a travel team together for a few years in high school.

Gandolfo also played against a couple of players from Cal State Fullerton.

“Just really trying to enjoy the moment and enjoy what we accomplished,” Caffrey said of the experience, “but we get back out to practice tomorrow and then it’s looking at the next thing to do.”

Bieser planned to get back in the office on Monday with his staff to start analyzing MSU and finding ways to put his team in the best position for success.

“SEC baseball, it’s more of a professional brand of baseball,” Bieser said. “You’ve got to be able to defend the small ball. It’s about pitching and defense and we’ve got to make sure we’re cleaning up that part of our game. We’ve also got to execute that side of the game offensively. When you’re playing against a true No. 1 in the SEC you have to be able to manufacture runs, and that’s something that we’ve got to start making sure we can do rather than just bang the ball off the wall.”

The Redhawks, who have won three consecutive OVC regular-season titles, played in their last regional in Tuscaloosa in 2002.

Southeast defeated host Alabama in the opening round on May 31 of that year.

“I’m still trying to process it all,” Boggetto said. “I’m still pretty tired from the whole thing, to be honest. Being here now and seeing our name on the TV, telling us where we’re going is just so surreal, and it’s just a great feeling knowing that what we set out to do earlier in the season, to win that conference tournament go to regionals, finally happened.”