A sweep at Texas brought up many questions about LSU (9-3) and exposed some of the team’s different flaws. A midweek game seemed oddly important early in the season as the offense looked to rebound after amassing only 16 hits in three games against Texas. LSU did just that in a 9-2 victory over Holy Cross (1-11).
Freshman right-hander Ma’Khail Hilliard started his first game of the season. Hilliard gave up an early homerun, and his outing didn’t last long. He was on a two inning limit, but he finished after throwing one-and-one-third innings with two strikeouts. Hilliard was pulled after walking two straight batters.
Down one run, LSU responded in the bottom half of the inning with a constant, but odd power source, this season — senior outfielder Antoine Duplantis. After spending three seasons with the Tigers, Duplantis never hit more than two homeruns in a year. The early score for LSU was Duplantis’ fourth home run of the year, which doubled his total from last season.
LSU continued to push runners across while their bullpen threw seven consecutive shutout innings. The Tigers took advantage of walks — scoring three runs off of Holy Cross base-on-balls. Junior outfielder Zach Watson hit a sacrifice fly after a walk, single and sac bunt put a runner at third. LSU tied the game at two in the third inning.
The fourth inning came around with the LSU pitchers throwing well. Duplantis was the early power source, but last season’s — sophomore outfielder Daniel Cabrera — wouldn’t be outdone.
“He [Duplantis] hit two homeruns the last years,” Cabrera said laughing. “I can’t let him beat me this year.”
Cabrera wouldn’t let Duplantis get too far away with the lead. Cabrera jumped on a 2-0 pitch and blasted a ball into the right field bleachers and gave LSU its first lead of the night, 3-2, and tally his fourth home run of the season.
During the Texas series, it seemed the approach from many of the Tigers was to do what Duplantis and Cabrera did — hit a homerun. The Tigers also swung at pitchers early in the count. Tonight, LSU was different, going deep into the count. The Tiger hitters drew a full count nine times. The offense put pressure on the pitcher by drawing walks.
LSU coach Paul Mainieri said that he thought sophomore infielder Hal Hughes was very selective at the plate tonight which helped him. Hughes finished with two walks and one run on the night.
The more patient approach showed significantly during the fifth inning when LSU scored four runs. A walk, hit-by-pitch and single put the bases were loaded for Cabrera with a 2-0 count. Holy Cross brought in a left-hander, and Cabrera laced a ball into right-center driving in two runs. Freshman first baseman Cade Beloso followed with an RBI single and put the LSU lead at seven to two.
Beloso looked like a complete hitter during the first few games of the season as he hit to all fields. Things changed while in Austin, and the defense placed a pull shift on him. He hit into the shift all weekend, and the pull theme continued tonight. Beloso hit three balls to the pull side tonight. Despite that, Beloso finished with a two-hit night and two RBI’s.
The offense had contribution throughout the lineup. Sophomore catcher Brock Mathis has picked up his offensive performance through the past two games. He went two for two with two RBI’s and walk in the final game against Texas. Mathis produced again tonight with a single in the third and homerun in the sixth.
Mathis said he began to relax at the plate and realized, “it’s the same game I’ve been playing since I was eight-years-old.”
LSU continued to tack on runs in the sixth and seventh innings behind Mathis’ homerun and a fielder’s choice RBI from Beloso.
“There were a lot of good things tonight and a couple not-so-good things, but overall we’ll take the win and look forward to a big weekend against Cal,” Mainieri said.