The first start of the 2018 season was a rough one for sophomore pitcher Zack Hess as the LSU Tigers fell to the Notre Dame Fighting Irish 10-5 on Saturday night.
Hess never settled in on the mound, allowing eight earned runs in 2.1 innings pitched. Notre Dame was able to drive Hess’ pitch count up by being patient at the plate. Hess walked six batters on the night, walking three of the first four batters.
“I gotta do a better job,” Hess said. “That was not a good job on my part, but my stuff feels fine. I gotta pitch to better counts and I have to command the baseball better.”
The Irish capitalized on Hess’ mistakes putting the Tigers in a deep hole early in the game.
Hess’ night would unravel in the third inning as seven Irishmen came to the plate. Hess walked three and allowed a two run homer to Eric Gilgenbach stretching the Irish lead to five before he was taken out for freshmen Trent Vietmeier.
“The biggest thing for us is we gotta score first,” senior designated hitter Beau Jordan said. “We just gotta jump ahead and keep pounding them. We gotta score first.”  
The Tigers were able to cut the deficit in half in the bottom of the fourth with a pair of hits by senior Nick Coomes and Brandt Broussard. Coomes drilled a single into right field driving in two runs. After a walk by Jordan, Broussard hit a liner through the infield scoring two of his own. The hit was the first of Broussard’s career.
Even with the big hit by Broussard, the Tigers were never able to work themselves out of their third inning hole.
“Nobody works harder and prepares more than Zack does, but he struggled tonight I’m sure he will be the first to tell you,” coach Paul Mainieri said. “That’s two nights in a row we have gotten in a big hole, tonight was a little bit too much.”
Despite the shaky start for Hess, the Tigers bullpen shutdown the Irish. A trio of three freshmen led the Tigers out of the bullpen allowing seven hits and no earned runs.
Vietmeir, Ma’Khail Hilliard and Devin Fontenot anchored the Tigers giving LSU a multitude of young options when the starters do not have their best stuff.
The Tigers need to get off to a quick start tomorrow after falling behind early in the first two games of the season.
“It’s early in the year and we’re trying to find out about different guys,” Mainieri said. “We’re seeing some good positive stuff. We just can’t make it a habit of digging a hole that big every game and expecting to get out of it.”
The Tigers will look to avenge their first loss of the season tomorrow when they finish the series against Notre Dame at 11am at Alex Box Stadium.