Baseball Bears Set for Weekend Series at No. 18 Mississippi State

Friday, February 21

Starkville, Miss.

2:00 p.m.

Missouri State University

Mississippi State

Baseball Bears Set for Weekend Series at No. 18 Mississippi State

February 19, 2025 | Baseball

Live Stats SECN+ (Game 1)SECN+ (Game 2)SECN+ (Game 3)Listen Game Notes

By: MSU Athletics Communications

Missouri State at #18 Mississippi State
Game 1	Feb. 21, 2 p.m. Dudy Noble Field Starkville, Miss. SECN+ \| Live Stats \| Listen Radio: KBFL 96.9FM/1060 AM
Game 2	Feb. 22, 2 p.m. Dudy Noble Field Starkville, Miss. SECN+ \| Live Stats \| Listen Radio: KBFL 96.9FM/1060 AM
Game 3	Feb. 23, 1 p.m. Dudy Noble Field Starkville, Miss. SECN+ \| Live Stats \| Listen Radio: KBFL 96.9FM/1060 AM
Missouri State	Game Notes Baseball Home Page
Mississippi State	Baseball Home Page

Starting 9
1) Missouri State (2-1) faces a test this weekend when the Bears travel to 18th-ranked Mississippi State (3-1) for a three-game series in Starkville. Game times are 2 p.m. Friday, 2 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. Sunday. After that, MoState visits Oral Roberts on Feb. 25 before hosting 16 of the next 21 games at Hammons Field from Feb. 28-April 1.

2) For the first time since 1983, the Bears have a new coach. Joey Hawkins, who played for the Bears from 2012-15 and served as assistant coach from 2022-24, is just the third head coach in program history. Bill Rowe managed the Bears from 1964-82 before becoming the school's athletic director. Keith Guttin, who played for MSU under Rowe, succeeded him in 1983 before retiring after the 2024 campaign.
In their respective first seasons, Rowe went 6-12 overall in 1964, while Guttin's 1983 club went 32-11 and led the nation with a .367 batting average.

3) Missouri State is 0-1 all-time against Mississippi State, with at 10-2 loss on March 26, 1991 in Starkville the only meeting. The Bears have been very competitive against the SEC over the last decade, going 16-21 against current members since the beginning of the 2015 season.

4) The Bears have homered in 112 of the last 134 games, and rank 15th nationally with 315 long balls since the beginning of the 2022 season, when Hawkins took over as hitting coach. MoState's 114 homers last season ranked second in school and fourth in MVC history.

5) Zack Stewart (33), Caden Bogenpohl (21), Taeg Gollert (21) and Nick Rodriguez (21) all have at least 20 homers in their MSU careers, and the current roster has combined for 115 round-trippers in their time at MoState.

6) Missouri State's pitching staff completed the opening weekend at Sam Houston with 41 strikeouts and 3.42 K-to-BB ratio, ranking fifth nationally in Ks/9 (14.2) and 38th in K/BB. The Bears had 12 or more strikeouts in all three games, a program first since February 2023, and Sunday's 15 Ks were the most since May 26, 2023.

7) Four former Freshman All-Americans are on the MSU roster. Nick Rodriguez received the honor in 2022 at Charleston Southern, Garrett Ferguson and Zack Stewart each landed on multiple such teams for MSU in 2023, and Caden Bogenpohl did the same last year for the Bears.

8) D1Baseball tabbed the Bears as the favorite to win the MVC this season, with sophomore Caden Bogenpohl as its preseason player of the year and Michael Yusypchuk as its freshman of the year. The MVC will release its preseason poll and all-conference teams on March 17 entering the first weekend of league play.

9) The 2025 season will be Missouri State's 35th and final year in the MVC. The university accepted an invitation to Conference USA on May 10, 2024, and will officially join that league on July 1, 2025. The baseball Bears own the most league wins (471) and highest MVC winning percentage (.581) of any current league school with six regular season championships and five tournament titles in 34 seasons.