In Game 1 of LSU baseball’s super regional, LSU won the battle of the batters with a dominant offensive performance.
The home team is fighting West Virginia in a best-of-three series this weekend for a spot in the Omaha eight. With a 16-9 win in Game 1, all the Tigers have to do is finish the job on Sunday.
Large shifts were made in the starting nine, most notably, senior Josh Pearson replaced freshman Derek Curiel in the batting lineup’s leadoff spot.
“I saw my name was in the leadoff spot, and I knew I had a job to do,” Pearson said.
After a week-long break, ace Kade Anderson took to the mound first for LSU. WVU’s ace Griffin Kirn joined the team’s starters after pitching in the final inning of their Sunday game.
While Anderson was still finding his groove, defense backed him up. Michael Braswell III fielded to first for an out, and Pearson kept hold of a fly ball after colliding with Chris Stanfield.
When it was the Tigers’ turn to bat, they couldn’t find the power as Pearson, Ethan Frey and Jared Jones all went out at the plate.
In the second, WVU was the first to get on base. Sam White led off and singled just in front of Stanfield. The next batter, Gavin Kelly, hit Anderson with the ball, allowing himself and White to advance a base.
The Mountaineers got the go-ahead run when White scored because Brawell decided to field it to first instead of home. Shortly after, Anderson finally got a strikeout to send LSU to the dugout.
“The hits didn’t come in the first few innings, but we made the pitcher work, and that was really important today,” head coach Jay Johnson said.
While offensive efforts proved fruitless in the early innings, LSU finally found some magic in the bats at the bottom of the fourth.
With Luis Hernandez and Dickinson on first and second from two hit-by-pitches, Curiel managed a home run. High and wide, his ball barely made it out of left field.
Now 3-1, the offensive momentum traveled into the fifth as Pearson immediately singled deep into right field and Frey stepped up to the plate.
In an attempt to slow LSU’s roll, WVU brought in one of their relievers for Kirn. That proved to be in the Tigers’ favor as Frey and Jones drew walks, forcing a second pitching change in the inning.
With no outs, the bases loaded and some electric hitting, Steven Milam homered and earned his first career grand slam.
As Milam and his teammates rounded the bases, LSU fans shook the stadium with their excitement.
With a third reliever entering the game, Tigers continued to score. Hernandez, Dickinson and Curiel all eventually made it home on RBIs.
A nightmare inning for WVU finally ended, and LSU led 10-1, but there is no quitting when a ticket to Omaha is on the line.
In return, WVU scored four in the next inning due to infield errors and Anderson’s inability to get a strikeout.
The Tigers swiftly loaded the bases and scored Milam and Hernandez on walks, but the team’s home-hitting worked its magic once again.
Similar to Milam, Pearson rocketed to right field and scored LSU its second grand slam of the day.
After two innings of masterclass hitting, the Tigers led 16-5.
In the seventh, WVU’s Kelly hit a home run that drove in White, but that’s all the team could manage in the inning.
Anderson was relieved after seven innings, seven strikeouts and an ERA of 3.58.
“If it was a regular-season game, maybe we would have taken him out a little bit earlier, but there’s nobody else I want out there on the mound,” Johnson said.
After a scoreless eighth, WVU kicked off the ninth with some firepower–another two RBI home run to make the score 16-9. Yet, it wasn’t enough to overcome the mountain of deficit, and LSU ran away with the win.
After their hitting heroics, the Tigers are headed to Game 2 on Sunday, June 7 at 5 p.m. CT. If they can hold off WVU for another day, LSU will be on its way to Omaha.
