LSU drops opening game in CWS

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By CASEY GISCLAIR


casey@tri-parishtimes.com

The LSU baseball team is on the ropes in Omaha.


The Tigers are one loss away from seeing their national championship hopes splattered in the eight-team College World Series.


LSU was thrust into its current situation after dropping a 2-1 pitchers’ duel in their opening game of the tournament against UCLA.

The Tigers played a losers’ bracket game against North Carolina at 2 p.m. on Tuesday afternoon with no score available at press time.


“It was a tough, tough loss – that’s for sure,” LSU coach Paul Mainieri said following the defeat. “There’s nothing but great teams in this tournament and very little margin for error. We’ve got to play better.”


Defense is the biggest culprit in the Tigers’ descent into the loser’s bracket.

UCLA didn’t plate a single earned run against the Tigers in their win on Sunday night – stringing together both of their runs off LSU errors.


The Tigers started out on top, taking a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the fourth inning when senior first baseman Mason Katz jerked a line-drive into the left-field bleachers for a solo home run.


That lead held up until the top of the sixth inning when the Bruins slid across a run to tie the game at 1.

The Bruins’ rally started when outfielder Brian Carroll bunted for a single to lead off the inning. In an attempt to throw Carroll out at first, LSU catcher Ty Ross threw the ball into the outfield, which allowed Carroll to take second base.


He later scored on a sacrifice fly by Eric Filia, which gave the Bruins their first unearned run of the game.


Their second came in the top of the eighth inning with freshman Christoph Bono on second base and two outs. It looked for a split second like the Tigers would get out of the inning unharmed when Filia poked a lazy ground ball to the left side of the infield.

But Tigers’ shortstop Alex Bregman booted the grounder, which allowed Filia to reach safely and Bono to touch home safely.

LSU threatened to tie or win the game in the bottom of the ninth with runners on first and second base with two outs and junior JaCoby Jones at the plate.

But the Tigers’ slugger couldn’t find Omaha magic and blooped a lazy fly ball to right field that was caught to end LSU’s chances, securing the Bruins’ win.

“I think all of our players would probably tell you that we didn’t play as well as we could tonight,” Mainieri said. “All the credit in the world goes to UCLA. They put pressure on us.”

With the loss, the Tigers will have their hands full to win the national championship.

The Tigers took on the Tar Heels on Tuesday afternoon in a loser goes home game.

North Carolina entered the tournament as the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA Tournament.

They lost their opening game in a blowout defeat at the hands of conference rival North Carolina State.

Mainieri said the Tigers must play with reckless abandon to recover and push forward.

They have experience in do-or-die situations after losing early in the SEC Tournament and rebounding to take home the title, winning several games in a row in the process.

“They slapped the ball on the ground and forced us to make a couple of plays, and we just came up empty on those plays,” Mainieri said. “We’ve got to just go back to playing good fundamental baseball.

“We get another chance to play on Tuesday, and we’ll get ready to do that.”

LSU senior first baseman Mason Katz applies a tag during Sunday night’s 2-1 loss to UCLA. The Tigers are now in the loser’s bracket of the College World Series. 

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