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FAYETTEVILLE — Following a series-opening win on Friday night, the Razorbacks’ offense built on a solid showing with the help of Brady Slavens.
The senior designated hitter came into Saturday night’s game on a cold streak, being held hitless in his last 17 at bats with ten strikeouts. He was able to put those struggles behind him in Arkansas’ 12-5 win over Mississippi State, going 2 for 4 with a home run, double and three RBIs.
Even after several tough showings at the plate in previous games, head coach Dave Van Horn kept faith in Slavens and believed he would be able to break out of the slump after watching Friday’s game — and the two before it — from the dugout.
“He kept a good attitude and just kind of realized, ‘I’m down here, I’m as low as I’ve been in a long time as a hitter, I’m going to build myself back up,’ and the coaches worked with him,” Van Horn said. “He came in early, stayed late hitting, working on things.”
Despite his poor start to the 2022 season, Slavens was able to hit his stride on Saturday night after a solid week of practice and focusing on what made him successful in the previous year.
“It was really just continuing to work hard,” Slavens said. “Really just kind of played with an edge. I’ve been trying to find that edge there for awhile now, and this week I just put my nose down, working hard and felt really good, really comfortable going into it. Kind of felt like I had gotten back to what I was used to.”
Slavens started his evening at the plate with a patient approach, drawing a four-pitch walk to load the bases in his first plate appearance after letting close pitches go for balls.
“It was big,” Van Horn said. “He laid off a couple sliders that were down that he had been swinging at a little bit lately, maybe a lot lately. Again, it’s just about realizing you can only get one hit in an at bat, can’t get two, and you’ve got to let the game come to you sometimes.”
His next contribution came soon after, crushing a two-run home run 376 feet onto the balcony of the Hunt Center. The two-out dinger was his first since the UIC series, when he hit home runs in back-to-back games.
Although he couldn’t keep that momentum going into his third plate appearance, when he went down looking, he bounced back in the following at bat.
Slavens’ second hit of the night came in the bottom of the sixth. Once again batting with two outs, he hammered a pitch from Jack Walker through the left-center gap and to the wall, driving in junior Robert Moore for Arkansas’ 12th and final run of the night.
The opposite-field knock was a promising sign for him, as he’d been over-swinging in many cases during his previous struggles in the box. Van Horn saw signs of this improved approach during pregame batting practices on Friday and Saturday.
“Yesterday was really good,” Van Horn said. “Then today was good. Going the other way. He only over-swung once tonight, to me that was the at bat after the home run… The first pitch he swung at a pitch that was up and he swung way too hard. Other than that, he stayed fairly calm and stayed within… He kind of took his batting practice into the game.”
The offensive rebound for Slavens was no surprise to the team, who believed it was only a matter of time until he returned to his 2021 form, when he hit 14 home runs and slugged his way to a .906 OPS.
“We all knew he had it in him,” sophomore Cayden Wallace said following the win. “He had a great year last year, so we know what we’re getting with him.”
Slavens isn’t the only Arkansas bat to find his swing of late. In their first two SEC series against Kentucky and Missouri, the Razorbacks put up only 18 total runs in each series.
Through two games in the Mississippi State series, the offense has scored 20 runs on 16 hits, 19 walks and 4 hit batters. Slavens credits this outburst to a better approach from the team as a whole.
“Just patient in the zone, wait for it to come in the zone,” Slavens said. “I think we were second in the nation in walks last year, so I think just having a better approach and knowing what we’re doing in the batter’s box.”
Although the 2022 squad has found success, it’s been through different avenues than the 2021 team, who relied much more on the long ball. On a per-game basis, Arkansas is hitting 1.3 dingers per game this year compared to 1.7 per game last season. Van Horn expects this number to rise as the season rolls on and the weather warms up, though.
“The weather is warming up — I mean it’s April 2, it’s early,” Van Horn said. “We haven’t harped on it or pressed about hitting home runs. We’ve been winning other ways. Now we hit home runs, and it helped us win tonight. We’re still going to hit a lot of home runs with this team before it’s over with.”
Looking ahead to Sunday’s rubber match, the Razorbacks will look to capture their third sweep of the season with a third win over the defending national champions.
“This was definitely a big series win, but it’s not over yet, so we’re focusing on tomorrow,” Wallace said. “They’re a good team, they have a good history and we’re just excited to be in game three and be two up right now.”
First pitch is scheduled for 2 pm CT and will be streamed on SEC Network-Plus.
