Louisiana Falls In Hard Fought Battle With Third-Ranked LSU, 5-4
HOUSTON – Hayden Travinski’s two-run single highlighted a four-run fifth inning before his solo home run in the seventh provided an insurance run as No. 3-ranked LSU earned a hard fought 5-4 victory over the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns in the nightcap of the Astros Foundation College Classic on Saturday at Minute Maid Park.
Jared Jones added an RBI double while Gage Jump (1-0) pitched 5.0 innings of one-hit ball as LSU (10-1) built a 4-0 lead after five innings before Louisiana (5-5) answered with three runs in the sixth and a solo homer in the ninth.
Louisiana will close out the weekend on Sunday when it faces the University of Houston (6-4) in the final game of the nine-game event at 7:05 p.m. The game will be streamed free on Astros.com and available on the Astros X, Facebook and YouTube pages.
The Louisiana-UH game will be televised by Space City Network and available on the channel in the entirety of the Astros’ five-state viewing area (Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma and New Mexico). SCHN is available on DirecTV, AT&T Uverse, Xfinity, Consolidated Communications, btel, Astound, Phonoscope, and I-Net.
Fans can listen to the game in the Lafayette area on KPEL-FM (96.5) and worldwide on the Varsity Network app.
In a game which carried a Super Regional feel played before an announced crowd of 21,726, both teams battled pitch-for-pitch through the first four innings before the Tigers broke a scoreless duel between Jump and Louisiana’s Andrew Herrmann (1-1).
Herrmann, making his second start of the season, kept LSU off balance in his 4.2 innings of work as he allowed one hit and fanned eight. The southpaw fanned three straight batters, beginning with Jared Jones to end the first inning, and opened a stretch of retiring seven in a row.
“He’s dirty, he’s hard to find and it’s (the ball) moving both ways when it gets to the plate and he’s a cool customer,” head coach Matt Deggs said about Herrmann. “He kept us right where we needed to be and I thought we pitched the ball outstanding tonight and we battled at the dish.
“That (LSU) is arm after arm and they got to one or two more (Louisiana) mistakes than we did.”
Herrmann didn’t allow a runner past second until the fifth after walks to Jake Brown and Paxton Kling and Tommy White’s single to right for LSU’s first hit of the game. A wild pitch by Herrmann allowed Brown to score from third before Travinski’s two-out single to left off Ragin’ Cajuns reliever Matthew Holzhammer scored Kling and White.
Jones followed with an RBI double off the wall in left to plate Travinski to give LSU a 4-0 advantage.
Louisiana would immediately answer in the top of the sixth after LSU reliever Griffin Herring opened the inning with a pair of strikeouts. Bryan Broussard, Jr., reached on a single up the middle for the Ragin’ Cajuns before Kyle DeBarge hit a sharp liner into left field to move Broussard into scoring position.
Duncan Pastore then followed with a towering home run into left field – his first in a Louisiana uniform – to get the Ragin’ Cajuns to within 4-3.
Travinski pushed the lead to 5-3 in the seventh when he hit the first pitch from David Christie for his second home run of the season.
Justin Loer, the fourth LSU pitcher used in the contest, pitched the final 2.1 innings to earn the save for the Tigers picked up the first two outs of the ninth before Jose Torres belted his first home run in the Ragin’ Cajuns uniform.
Trey LaFleur added an infield single for Louisiana, which outhit the Tigers 6-5, but Loer got John Taylor looking at a breaking ball for a called third strike to preserve the win.
Jump struck out five batters in earning the win for the Tigers, who improved to 2-0 on the weekend after a win over Texas on Friday. Herring, Gavin Guidry and Loer combined for nine strikeouts on the evening.
Christie and JT Etheridge combined to fan six batters for the Ragin’ Cajuns over the final 3.0 innings. Five Cajun pitchers combined to fan 14 batters in the contest – the ninth straight game with 10 or more strikeouts as a staff.
LaFleur finished 2-for-4 for the Ragin’ Cajuns while Pastore and Torres each recorded their first career homers.
“I was proud of the way we battled,” said Deggs. “Two outs, nothing going and two strikes on (Bryan) Broussard and he knocks one up the middle, another two-out knock by D-Bo (DeBarge) and a big two-strike, two-out homer to get us back in the ballgame.
“What an inning as David Christie comes in and gives us and JT (Etheridge) looked awesome. We’re right there. We’re playing teams as good as it gets at our (collegiate) level and we’re a big hit, a big play away and we’re going to keep plugging until we get there.”
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