Nicholls adds 5 in post-Signing Day catch
June 4, 2013
Next up: Oklahoma comes to LSU with elite pitching depth
June 4, 2013
A local boy used his powerful left arm to push the LSU baseball team into the Super Regionals.
Houma native and Thibodaux High School graduate Brent Bonvillain earned the win for the Tigers in Sunday night’s final between the Tigers and UL-Lafayette.
The lanky lefty pitched five and one-third innings, allowing just three hits and one run. His effort was plenty enough to muscle LSU to a 4-1 win.
The victory capped a perfect 3-0 weekend for the Tigers. For their efforts, they earned a spot in the NCAA Super Regionals this weekend where they will play a Best of Three series with Oklahoma.
“I have no idea where it came from,” Bonvillain said following the start. “I just went out there and tried to have fun. It was really exciting. It’s hard to put into words winning a NCAA Regional with LSU – a team that I’ve always dreamt of playing with and always looked up to play because I lived in Louisiana.”
Bonvillain set the tone for Sunday’s win from the opening innings.
After a weekend of shaky and inconsistent pitching for LSU, the senior kept the Ragin Cajuns off the board for the first five innings in a row.
Bonvillain didn’t face much adversity throughout his 16 outs, throwing just 62 pitches on the day, allowing just one walk.
His performance was needed in the early stages of the game, because ULL’s starter wasn’t half bad, either.
Ragin Cajuns’ lefty Cody Boutte kept LSU in check for the first four innings of the game.
In the fifth, Boutte ran out of steam and allowed the Tigers to put together a two-out rally that was capped when Ty Ross walked with the bases loaded to give LSU a 1-0 lead.
“If it weren’t for Brent Bonvillain, we would have had a difficult time winning that ball game,” LSU coach Paul Mainieri said. “Their starter gave a courageous effort, and their kids played their hearts out. For our pitching staff to hold their offense to only three hits – that speaks volumes for the job that (Bonvillain) did.”
In the sixth, LSU exploded for three more to blow the game open and take a 4-0 lead. The big blow in that rally was a two-RBI base knock from senior Raph Rhymes that plated junior second baseman JaCoby Jones and freshman shortstop Alex Bregman.
UL cut the lead to 4-1 in the bottom of the sixth when Jace Conrad plated Dex Kjerstad.
But LSU took the run back in the eighth inning off a solo home run from Bregman, which pushed the game to its final margin.
Bregman finished the game 3-for-4 with 2 RBI.
He was named the Baton Rouge Regional’s Most Outstanding Player – an honor he said he savors because it came just two days after he collided with Rhymes in the opener against Jackson State – a blow that sent him to the hospital for tests.
“It’s all because of my teammates,” Bregman said. “Because of them, I got good pitches to hit today. Everybody one-through-nine was competing, and that’s all you can ask for out of an offense. I think everybody battled, and that just helped me because when I saw them battle, I knew I had to battle.”
Bregman mentioned the word ‘battle’.
That’s exactly what the Tigers had to do to earn the right to play the Ragin Cajuns in the finals.
In Saturday’s semifinal game against Sam Houston, LSU trailed 5-1 after committing three first-inning errors.
The Tigers chipped away at the deficit in the second and third innings, pushing the score to 5-4. But the Bearkats settled in and held the one-run lead into the eighth inning.
But in that inning, LSU rallied and took control for good, scoring four runs to secure a hard-fought 8-5 win.
Bregman was again the offensive centerpiece against the Bearkats, going 3-of-6 with an RBI.
But the Tigers’ offensive output was spread throughout the lineup. Six different players recorded an RBI in the win.
With the lead, closer Chris Cotton pitched a flawless eighth and ninth to secure the win.
His effort sealed the win for sophomore ace Aaron Nola, who threw more than 40 pitches in the first inning and allowed five unearned runs.
He settled in and was dominant the rest of the outing.
“This was one of the craziest games we’ve had,” Mainieri said following the win. “I told the players at the end of the game that it was one of the most gratifying and enjoyable wins I’ve had since I’ve been here. Anything that could go wrong did go wrong in the first inning. … I knew we’d come back and win this game, because I know Aaron Nola. He will keep us in the game. … It took the whole game to do it, but I had no doubt about these kids.”
One day before rallying past Sam Houston State, LSU slugged its way past Jackson State 11-7 in a sloppy game for both teams.
LSU walked seven batters and hit four more with pitches in the game.
Jackson State wasn’t much better, recording four errors in the loss.
Kurt McCune earned the win for LSU in the opener, slinging four and two-thirds innings of shutout relief.
With the successful weekend, the Tigers are now one of just 16 teams left in the NCAA Tournament.
LSU will tangle with Oklahoma next weekend in Alex Box Stadium in a best of three series.
Mainieri said the regional win is just one check off the team’s long list of goals for the 2013 season – a list that includes Omaha.
We are obviously very happy to move onto the next step,” Mainieri said. “We’ve won three championships this year, but there was no dog pile on the mound, because we know that was three-fifths of the job that needs to be done to get to Omaha. We had three big wins, and the players know it takes five.”
LSU senior pitcher Brent Bonvillain fires a pitch during Sunday’s Regional final between LSU and UL-Lafayette. The Tigers won the game 5-1 and advanced to the NCAA Tournament’s Super Regional round. Bonvillain earned the win against the Ragin’ Cajuns, pitching a career-high five and one-third innings, allowing just one unearned run.
