Evans, Tigers cruise to Thursday win versus Sooners

By Hunt Palmer

THE STORY

Good guests bring gifts.

Oklahoma offered them up immediately on Thursday night, and Casan Evans was an extremely rude host. The Tigers scored four runs before recording a hit, and Evans handcuffed the Sooners all night in a 7-1 LSU win.

Evans was the story. Four of his five outings had been underwhelming entering the game. Thursday night was his best of the season by a country mile. It was the best of his career with apologies to Little Rock.

He had fastball command, a sharp breaking ball and a vanishing changeup. Oklahoma didn’t have an answer for any of it.

Evans scattered three singles in different innings. The only other Sooner to reach came on a dropped third strike. That was one of his 15 strikeouts, 12 looking. It was true swing and miss stuff.

Oklahoma’s lone run came on another dropped third strike. With a runner at second, Cade Arrambide blocked it nicely and fired to first in time. With the runner streaking toward third, Zach Yorke threw across the diamond, the ball skipped away allowing the run to score.

Yorke has to put the ball in his pocket with Evans rolling and two outs in the inning. It was a mental error compounded by a poor throw.

Speaking of errors, Oklahoma made three of them in the second inning. LSU plated four in the frame with one hit. All three miscues were throwing errors on the infield that were largely unforced. That was no help to former Tiger Cam Johnson who was nowhere near the strike zone for the second straight week.

He walked four in the first to force home a run. It would have been five walks had John Pearson not swung at ball four a foot out of the zone. Johnson is incredibly gifted, but the pitcher who couldn’t find the zone as a Tiger in 2024 and a Sooner in 2025 has resurfaced following four good pre-conference weeks. He walked six on Thursday in an inning and a third.

It wasn’t a banner night for LSU on offense, especially with runners in scoring position, but Johnson and his defense helped.

Yorke poked a two-run single into center in the seventh after back-to-back doubles by Pearson and Omar Serna.

Zac Cowan got the final four outs with relative ease. That’s his second straight solid outing.

LSU needed a relatively easy win, and it came Thursday.

THE SCORECARD

Casan Evans: 7.2 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 15 K, 110 pitches, 76 strikes.

LSU got the leadoff man on in 6-of-8 innings. It scored in two of those six.

Oklahoma only had three at bats with runners in scoring position. They were 0-for-3.

LSU was 3-for-18 with runners in scoring position and left 10 men on base.

LSU walked one, Evans’s last hitter. Oklahoma walked eight.

WHAT’S NEXT

LSU and Oklahoma return to action Friday night at 6:30. LSU will send Cooper Moore to the mound, and Oklahoma will counter with LJ Mercurius who has been excellent early on. His ERA is 1.59 through five starts.