By Hunt Palmer
THE STORY: And they’re off.
Kade Anderson smothered the Purdue-Fort Wayne bats for five innings, and LSU pounced on some early generosity from the visiting Mastodon defense to take an early 5-0 lead and win easily, 14-0.
Anderson struck out eight including six of the first eight he faced. His fastball sat around 92 mph early in the game and ticked up to 94 when he needed to get a strikeout. That was a gear Anderson featured as a freshman, but his new-look slider stifled the Mastodons consistently.
The only trouble Anderson found himself in was a 1st and 2nd, no one out jam in the 4th. He retired the next three in order using a pair of punchouts to extinguish the threat.
Transfer centerfielder Chris Stanfield snared a line shot sinking toward the grass in center for a diving catch and the second out of the fifth inning. That was the highlight for an LSU defense that was the beneficiary of 17 strikeouts by Tiger pitching.
Meanwhile the LSU offense managed to roll up 14 runs without the benefit of a homer on a blustery day at Alex Box Stadium.
The Tigers batted around in the first thanks to two Purdue-Fort Wayne errors and four Tiger hits. LSU added two more in the second to nudge the lead to 7-0 and remove the drama early.
Freshman fireballer Casan Evans stole the show out of the LSU bullpen. He came out lighting up the radar gun at 98 mph and struck out four of the six he faced over two perfect innings. After blowing a couple of Mastodon hitters with heaters, he went to the slider for a couple more.
Cooper Williams slammed the door in the ninth with three straight strikeouts, too.
Daniel Dickinson’s debut at the plate was excellent. He collected three hits in four at bats and drove in five runs. His ringing two-run double to left in the second inning was the highlight.
Freshman Derek Curiel notched a pair of hits including a drag bunt that rolled all the way into the third base bag.
All in all, it was a dominant day for LSU that allowed Jay Johnson to use 20 position players and four pitchers. The Tigers hit the ball hard and only made one misplay in the field, a catcher’s interference on Luis Hernandez in the second.
The fear in an opener is playing tight. Anderson’s dominance and a couple of early Purdue-Fort Wayne mistakes eased LSU in. The Tigers never looked back.
THE SCORECARD: LSU used 20 of 21 available position players. Eddie Yamin did not see action.
Anderson, Evans, Jacob Mayers and Cooper Williams combined to throw nine innings of shutout ball, striking out 17 and walking just one.
Hernandez was the only LSU starter not to record a hit.
LSU outhit the Mastodons 14-4.
LSU drew eight walks.
LSU scored in seven of eight offensive innings.
Both Pearson brothers, Josh and John had a double.
THE QUOTES: Winning pitcher Kade Anderson on his calm demeanor…
“I think I have to give a lot of credit to (pitching) coach (Nate) Yeskie and honestly Luke Holman has helped me a lot with that. If you know him, he’s got the slowest heartbeat I’ve ever seen…I think going into every start, I’m trying to make it as boring as possible, not trying to do anything special.”
Jay Johnson on the win…
“It was good to get to a gameday. I don’t want to go backwards, but the last game we played was one of the toughest losses of my career, so it’s nice to get past that one. There’s so much that goes into it besides gameday, running a program, recruiting, development. There’s a player that finally took the field for me today that I’ve been recruiting since he was in the seventh grade. Pretty cool.”
On recruiting Casan Evans…
“There’s recruiting battles that when you win them you know it makes a massive impact. He came back for a second unofficial visit or something like that, and we were having lunch at Walk On’s. He said something, and I was like, ‘wait a minute, is he trying to tell me he’s coming here?’ Then he made it a little clearer, and I jumped across the table and gave him a big bear hug. At that time, I knew that was going to be important. Maybe he flew under the radar. You have a (Derek) Curiel. You have a (William) Schmidt. Last year when I went out and met with all of them about the (MLB) Draft, he was the first one I went to.”
WHAT’S NEXT? The Tigers and Mastodons will play Game 2 of the series Saturday morning at 11:00. LSU will hand the ball to Anthony Eyanson, the UC-San Diego transfer making his LSU debut.
