After a non-conference schedule that saw dominant hitting, heartbreaking losses and the emergence of two freshman pitchers, LSU (16-6) begins Southeastern Conference play Friday when it travels to Jane B. Moore Field to play Auburn (17-3-1).
After starting the season 0-2, LSU has slowly begun to resemble the top-20 ranking it came into the year with. Wins against teams such as Washington, Stanford and Iowa St. have sparked confidence in the team heading into conference play.
One of LSU’s problems early on was the ability to come back from an early deficit. Those problems have also been resolved with multiple comeback victories, including a 5-3 win against Northwestern St. where LSU came back from down three runs in the fifth.
Sophomore catcher Kellsi Kloss, who hit a two-run home run in the fifth inning, said the offensive production gives the team confidence.
“It gives us a lot of confidence, we’ve come back from behind a lot, like yesterday [against Northwestern St.] and against Stanford,” Kloss said. “We know that we can do it. … We’re going to try to come out scoring early, and if we don’t, we know we can always come from behind.”
One of the biggest questions heading into LSU’s season was how the team would replace former All-Ameican pitcher Rachele Fico. The rise of freshman Baylee Corbello and Kelsee Selman has been one of the biggest answers to that question.
Corbello has been sensational since the beginning, throwing complete games in all nine of her starts and throwing four shutouts as well. She leads all LSU pitchers so far in wins (7), earned run average (1.07) and strikeouts (60).
Corbello’s most recent display of excellence came in a six-hit, five-strikeout shutout in LSU’s 1-0 win against Iowa St. on Saturday.
Until recently, Selman struggled with her transition to college play, allowing seven earned runs in her first 15 innings of work. But a no-hitter last Friday and a shutout Saturday helped earn Selman SEC Pitcher of the Week honors.
Selman showed more composure during Tuesday’s win against Northwestern St., coming in for struggling senior pitcher Ashley Czechner and pitched 4.2 innings of relief, allowing no runs.
Selman said she was simply doing what her coaches asked of her.
“I kind of knew my job was to be the relief,” Selman said. “So if she needed me to come in, I would just have to get the job done. I just went in there with confidence knowing that I can do it.”
Auburn comes off a disappointing 2013 campaign in which it finished 10 games less than .500 in the SEC. But Auburn has shown improvement under new coach Clint Myers, winning 14 of its past 16 games, including a 4-1 record last week in the Diamond 9 Citrus Classic.
A key part of Auburn’s success is the development of sophomore pitchers Lexi Davis and Marcy Harper. Davis has started the season 8-3 after going 9-9 the year before, while Harper leads the team with an opponent’s batting average of .176.
“With the coaching change over there you didn’t know how things were going to turn out and how they were going to reflect, but they’ve responded pretty well,” said hitting coach Howard Dobson. “Their numbers have seemed to go down, their strikeouts have seemed to go up, and they’re going to be a good challenge for us.”
Contact Tommy Romanach at [email protected]
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