HATTIESBURG, Miss. — Jacksonville State’s historic baseball season ended Sunday night with a 6-3 loss to Little Rock in the championship round of the Hattiesburg Regional.
The fourth-seeded Trojans defeated the third-seeded Gamecocks for the second time in as many days to secure the program’s first Super Regional berth.
Jax State finished with a program-record 48 wins. The Gamecocks also captured their first regular-season and conference tournament championships since 2019.
“It’s just a special season for this group, and it’s a special group of guys that you want to be around every single day,” Jax State head coach Steve Bieser said. “And I’ve said that from Day 1 — win or lose — this is a group and a team that I would love to coach continuously.”
For Bieser, however, the season’s end means saying goodbye to a senior class that helped fuel the program’s resurgence.
Among them is shortstop Caleb Johnson, who spent all four years of his collegiate career at Jax State — an increasingly uncommon path in the era of the transfer portal.
Johnson, a member of Bieser’s inaugural Jax State team that went 18-34, started 209 games in his career and finished with 208 hits, 175 runs, 128 RBIs and 60 stolen bases.
“Being here for four years, I’ve been through the ups and downs throughout this program,” an emotional Johnson said. “I’ve loved every minute of it. This year, it was awesome. It’s the most fun I’ve ever had.”
Left-hander Steven Cash, a member of the Gamecocks’ starting rotation the past two seasons, also made his final appearance in a Jax State uniform Sunday.
He helped Jax State reach the Conference USA tournament championship game as a junior, and the Gamecocks carried that late-season momentum into their record-setting 2026 campaign.
“As well as we competed this year, it’s just been fun to play with these guys, especially with all the returners we had from last year’s team, to even the new guys this year, it’s been awesome,” Cash said.
Cash helped Jax State reach the championship round with a dominant pitching performance in an elimination game against second-seeded Virginia on Sunday afternoon. He was named to the Hattiesburg Regional All-Tournament team after silencing the high-powered Cavaliers’ bats for seven innings. He struck out 10 batters in the 33rd and final start of his Jax State career.
He finished his senior season with a 9-2 record, posting a 3.03 ERA while striking out 103 batters over 89⅔ innings.
Outfielders Ace Williamson and Greg LaChance, first basemen Brady Thomas and Orlando Peña, relief pitchers Chase Horst and Jackson Sleeper, and starting pitcher Beau Bryans also were impact seniors on Jax State’s roster.
It’s a group that means a lot to Bieser.
“I can’t say enough about these guys. They’ll run through a wall for you, and I hope that they know that I would do the same for them,” Bieser said. “It’s not just about a few seasons that we’ve had here together. This is a lifetime that we want to continue those relationships. I want to be at their weddings and watch them raise kids and all those things.
“These guys are really special, and I want to make sure that they stay a part of my life.”
Before the emotional post-game farewells, the Gamecocks fought through a tense, back-and-forth finale.
Little Rock scored the first three runs, but Johnson trimmed the deficit to 3-2 with a two-run single in the top of the fourth inning.
After the Trojans added a run in the fifth, Jax State got back within one in the seventh after Cooper Blauser scored on an RBI groundout by Grayson Ashe.
Little Rock tacked on two insurance runs in the eighth inning to push the lead to 6-3.
Down to their final three outs, the Gamecocks battled until the bitter end. After Thomas, who was also named to the All-Tournament team, hit a one-out double, Matthew Cash drew a two-out walk, and Ashe reached on a fielder’s choice to put the potential game-tying run on first base.
But Little Rock’s Brody Bunting struck out Luke Williams to end the game and Jax State’s historic season.
“This team, they just compete, and you love showing up every single day because you know you’re going to get their best effort,” Bieser said. “What you saw tonight, if you went back and watched the 60-plus games or whatever we played, you would see, even in the losses, we get our tying run on in the last inning, and we still have a chance to strike.
“There’s just no quit in this team.”