WHAT HAPPENED: Mississippi State snapped Florida's streak of series wins with a 12-4 win on Friday night in Starkville.
 
Entering the weekend, the Gators had won 19 regular season series in a row dating back to last season. The last series loss was April 7-9, 2017, against Tennessee when the Vols took two in Gainesville.
 
In addition, it's the first three-game losing streak for Florida since being swept at Auburn March 17-19, 2017.
 
Mississippi State jumped out to an early lead, scoring two runs in each of the first three innings for a 6-2 lead. The Bulldogs used a six-run fifth inning to blow the game open.
 
Florida tied the game at two in the top of the second inning after a RBI double from Blake Reese but MSU responded with two runs in the bottom of the inning.
 
UF starting pitcher Brady Singer was scratched prior to the game after pulling up with a hamstring issue during pregame warmups. The coaching staff decided to hold him out for precautionary reasons as the Gators prepare for the start of postseason play next week.
 
Freshman Jack Leftwich was forced into action and pitched three innings with six runs allowed on eight hits. He tied his season high with seven strikeouts.
 
IN THE SPOTLIGHT: Hunter McMullen – Freshman Hunter McMullen took over on the mound in the fifth inning and pitched the final 3.1 innings without allowing a hit. He retired the final 10 batters he faced in the game. He walked one and had three.

FROM THE COACH: Head coach Kevin O'Sullivan on tonight's game: "At the end of the game, basically what I told the team is this: we've won 19-straight series. We won the SEC outright today [with the Arkansas loss]. We can't let one series affect how we play moving forward. We've just gotten beat. We've got to stick together, no finger pointing or any of those types of things. We just got beat. We've been extremely successful here for a long time. We've got to keep our heads together and go out and play a clean game tomorrow."
 
"My job is to know our personnel going into the postseason. I think after this weekend and after the SEC Tournament, a couple of these guys will get some more opportunities, I'll have a really good feel for who can do what at this time of year when everything gets dialed up a little bit more. There are some positives to take away, obviously disappointed with the outcome today, but we'll come out tomorrow and hopefully get another great start out of Jackson Kowar. His last two starts have probably been the best two of his career here. We'll get him going and keep him on track then head up to Hoover on Sunday."
 
On starter Jack Leftwich: "The thing with Jack, if he can figure it out, to finish hitters and locate his pitches down in the zone a little bit better. He's been making mistakes with two strikes. He just needs to finish innings, and that's been a recurring thing for him going back to the fall. But if he can learn to finish hitters and finish innings I think he's going to take a huge jump forward. It's not his stuff; his stuff was really good tonight."
 
On Brady Singer: "Brady hasn't missed a start in his whole career, but he had a little hamstring issue and I certainly didn't want to take any chances. Obviously we need him down the stretch."
 
On JJ Schwarz, who exited the game in the fifth inning: "Unfortunately he got hit on a foul tip behind the plate. He was going to come out the next inning anyways. It looks like a bruise so we probably dodged a bullet there."
 
STANDOUT STAT: 2 – Sophomore Austin Langworthy hit his second home run in as many games on Friday night. Entering the weekend, he had not hit a home run on the year. He had not hit a home run in 54 games, the longest homerless streak on the team, with his last long ball coming against Louisville (6/20/17) in the 2017 College World Series.

UP NEXT: Florida and Mississippi State will wrap up the series on Saturday at 4:30 p.m. on ESPNU.