HATTIESBURG — Southern Miss might have too much ground to make up to win the Sun Belt Conference regular-season championship, but it’s certainly showing it’ll be a team to reckon with in the postseason.

The Golden Eagles scored seven runs in the sixth inning and wound up with a 15-5 run-rule victory over Louisiana-Lafayette Saturday at Pete Taylor Park.

Southern Miss (37-13, 20-6 Sun Belt) extended its winning streak to 11 games and won its fifth consecutive conference series. It’s in second place in the Sun Belt, three games back of frontrunner Coastal Carolina (41-11, 23-4) with four to play. It’s also 2 1/2 games ahead of third-place Troy, which hosts USM next weekend to finish the regular season.

Southern Miss and Louisiana (26-25, 15-11) finish their three-game series in Hattiesburg Sunday at 1 p.m. The game will be streamed on ESPN+.

The Sun Belt tournament begins May 20 in Montgomery, Alabama.

Joey Urban hit a two-run single in the big sixth inning, but most of Southern Miss’ runs came via free passes. Two batters were walked and three more were hit with the bases loaded to bring in runs. USM had a total of seven walks and hit batters in the inning.

Drey Barrett finished the game in the bottom of the seventh inning with a two-run double.

Barrett finished 2-for-4 with four RBIs, Urban was 3-for-5 with two RBIs and two runs scored, and Ben Higdon had two hits and scored twice for Southern Miss. Matthew Russo also hit a two-run home run in the third inning.

USM starting pitcher matthew Adams went 5 1/3 innings and had four strikeouts. Colby Allen had three strikeouts in 1 2/3 innings of scoreless relief to close it out.

The sixth-inning rally blew the game back open, after Louisiana had cut a 6-1 margin to 6-5. Blaine Lucas and Caleb Stelly both hit two-run home runs to power the short-lived comeback.

Stelly was 2-for-3 with two RBIs and two runs scored, and Lucas also had two hits and two RBIs.