(Photo Credit: @LSUbaseball on X)
By Hunt Palmer
THE STORY
Some losses are worse than others.
That one was awful.
South Carolina knotted the score with a ninth inning solo shot from freshman KJ Scobey and won it, 6-5, on a wild pitch four hitters later. Jase Woita’s one-out towering triple off the wall in left field set it up.
LSU had its man on the mound. Closer Zac Cowan got the ball with a two-run lead in the eighth and couldn’t hold it. He surrendered a leadoff triple to Henry Kaczmar in that eighth inning. Kaczmar scored on Kennedy Jones’s RBI single.
Cowan recorded three outs to follow but couldn’t slam the door in the ninth.
Josh Pearson looked to have made the play of the season in the bottom of the seventh. With two on and one out in a tied game, Pearson made a diving catch of a sinking line drive from Nathan Hall and popped up to double the runner off of second base.
If the ball drops and or gets by him, Carolina takes the lead. Instead, LSU grabbed the bats and took a 5-3 lead with some quality offense.
Daniel Dickinson singled to lead it off, and Jake Brown smoked a ground ball through the right side on a hit and run to put runners at the corners. After Brown stole second and Pearson was intentionally walked, Steven Milam drove in the run with a sacrifice fly to left field.
Michael Braswell’s third hit of the night added an insurance run to make it 5-3. It wasn’t enough.
I didn’t mind Cowan’s outings in College Station. The Aggies hit some good pitches. He got touched up on Thursday night, and the wild pitch to end it was his worst pitch of the night. It was Cowan’s first truly bad outing of the year, and it came at a terrible time.
That one stings badly. It was LSU’s first loss in 28 games when leading after eight, and it came to a team sporting a 5-22 record in league play.
In a way, the Tigers deserve it. LSU controlled the early innings and weren’t able to separate.
Offensively, LSU wasn’t good enough. Some of that is due to poor swings. Some is due to poor fortune. And some of it was awful baserunning.
LSU grounded into two double plays with two men on against sinkerball starter Ashton Crowther. That’s what he’s out there to do, and LSU got on top of a pair of balls in the second and fourth in run scoring chances.
LSU did score one in the fifth. It should have been as many as three or four. The Tigers were thrown out at third base twice. Braswell ran through a stop sign on a single to right, and Derek Curiel didn’t slide on a single to left.
Both were puzzling and massively crippling.
South Carolina won a game in which they were hitless through five innings. There are reasons for that.
Conner Ware’s control was a disaster. He hit the first batter he faced and walked another in the first only to induce a double play ball to get out of it. No such luck in the second when he walked the first three hitters of the inning before being lifted for Jaden Noot.
The runway for Ware is gone now. It’s postseason time, and he just can’t be relied upon in huge spots. Trusted arms are in short supply for LSU, so he may get be called upon at some point, but there are options in front of him.
Noot was good.
He recorded 12 outs and didn’t walk anyone. He ran out of gas in the sixth and gave up a single and an RBI triple before giving way to Chase Shores. Undoubtedly the Noot outing was a positive one.
Shores worked two scoreless innings in a tied game, as well. That was another step in the right direction for him.
The Tigers are still in reasonably good shape for the weekend. Kade Anderson will get the ball Friday, and Anthony Eyanson will start Saturday. Casan Evans in available along with bullpen arms like Mavrick Rizy and others. South Carolina is still a historically poor SEC baseball team.
But the wiggle room is gone. LSU still needs two wins this weekend, and only two games remain. At some point the Tiger offense is going to have to show up on the road. If it doesn’t over the next two days, it may have to come postseason time as opposed to playing at Alex Box Stadium.
THE SCORECARD
Zac Cowan’s line: 1.2IP, 4H, 3R, 3ER, 1BB, 1K, 34 pitches, 21 strikes
Jaden Noot’s line: 4IP, 2H, 2R, 2ER, 0BB, 5K, 55 pitches, 37 strikes
Chase Shores’s line: 2IP, 2H, 0R, 0BB, 1K, 31 pitches, 21 strikes
Michael Braswell: 3-for-3, 2B, RBI, BB
Daniel Dickinson: 2-for-3, HR, 2R, 2RBI,
Jared Jones: 2-for-5, RBI, R
Henry Kaczmar: 2-for-3, 2 3B, 2R, 2BB, RBI
KJ Scobey: 2-for-3, HR, 2RBI
LSU outhit South Carolina 11-8
LSU left nine on base. South Carolina left five
WHAT’S NEXT
LSU and South Carolina are back at it Friday evening at 6:00 central. Tiger ace Kade Anderson (6-1, 3.66 ERA) will take the ball on his normal rest. South Carolina will go to southpaw Jake McCoy who is the only Gamecock starter to make nine league starts. SEC opponents have hit .313 against McCoy. He allowed seven earned to Auburn last weekend.
