A 7-3 loss to Penn St. last Friday made LSU coach Beth Torina re-evaluate her lineup and how to use the freshmen effectively.
The loss came after a dominating performance against Oklahoma St, which is what caused concern for the coaching staff.
Torina tried to utilize her freshman class, but it was just too much too soon.
“I think a lot of the issue was that I had four freshmen in the game and a catcher that has never caught in a game before behind the plate,” Torina said. “It was probably too much and that’s on me. That’s 100 percent my fault.”
Freshman pitcher Maribeth Gorsuch started in the circle for the Tigers and had a solid first two innings until things got away from her in the third and she was relieved by junior pitcher Carley Hoover.
“You saw flashes of what she’s capable of,” Torina said. “She’s going to be a superstar. We just have to build her up to it and figure out what went wrong.”
Until Gorsuch can figure out where things went wrong, Torina will rely on her returning pitching staff.
While the team would like to learn lessons without a loss, they are trying to see the value in it.
“This weekend was more seeing what we needed to work on,” senior catcher Sahvanna Jaquish said. “Really focusing on putting together what we’ve been practicing over and over again. We’re just going to take what we’ve learned from these games.”
Jaquish started behind the plate in four games and in one game moved to catcher after starting at third base.
Sophomore infielder Taylor Satchell started behind the plate in the first game against Penn St., but was replaced by Jaquish. Satchell started at third base twice last year and only played in seven games in the season.
“I think the whole team just feels differently when [Jaquish] is back there and controlling the situation,” Torina said.
Senior second baseman Constance Quinn and freshman Nicky Dawson both started at second base. The two create a lot of depth at that position between Quinn’s experience and Dawson’s speed.
Quinn has started at second base 111 times the last two years.
“We are all diverse in the lineup, and that is something really hard for another team to deal with,” Jaquish said.
Sophomore outfielder Elyse Thornhill started at left field four games, but was replaced towards the end of game by freshman outfielder Aliyah Andrews.
Torina said that the team needs Andrews playing defense at the end of any game, or whenever they are in a tight spot.
Senior outfielder Bailey Landry has started every game the last two years for the Tigers, and things won’t change this year.
For the three games following the Penn St. loss, the lineup looked more familiar, adding pinch runners and hitters when needed. Adjustments were made as the game went on rather than changing the starting lineup.
Torina had questions about who was going to hit around Jaquish, but the hitting by newcomers Amanda Doyle and Sydney Springfield made Torina’s decision-making easy.
“We had so many question marks about who’s going to hit behind Sahvanna or around Sahvanna,” Torina said. “We thought a lot of people were capable of that and Sydney especially, but also Amanda Doyle, [Allie] Walljasper [and Shemiah] Sanchez. All those guys showed they can step up to the plate.”
Doyle and Springfield were competing for the first base position, and they both earned starts; however, Doyle started four of the five games at first base.
While Springfield and Doyle willw continue to compete for a starting spot at first base, they will both be crucial to the offense this season.
Doyle was practicing at third base during spring practice, but sophomore infielder Shemiah Sanchez proved that she has third base on lockdown.
Sanchez started nine games for the Tigers last year, with six of them at second base and three as designated player. This year, Sanchez is playing third base and seems to have adjusted pretty well to her new spot.
“I was so impressed with her honestly,” Torina aid after the second day of the Tiger Classic. “Shemiah has done such a great job. A couple of the plays she made tonight were not easy. Not to mention her approach at the plate and not even the fact that she’s getting hits. She’s having really intelligent conversations, she has bought into everything we’ve asked her to do.”
After five games, the infield started to click with the new adjustments. The team came back from deficits twice and learned from an early loss in the season.
“I have a long road ahead to understand how to manage this group and how to utilize our strengths,” Torina said.