Tonight’s game against Southern Miss is a bit of a flashback for the No. 21 LSU softball team — but not the good kind.
Just more than a month ago, the Golden Eagles (17-29) provided the Tigers (31-15) with the low point of their season. LSU made the quick trip to Hattiesburg, Miss., coming off a five-game Southeastern Conference losing streak and proceeded to get slapped, 7-0.
“That was a bad night,” said LSU coach Yvette Girouard. “We basically got off the bus, got beat, go back on the bus, ate and went home.”
The loss was an exclamation point on a rough week for LSU, dropping the team to 15-11 and in danger of missing the postseason. It’s not a night the Tigers have forgotten.
“[Wednesday] is a chance to make up for last time,” said junior shortstop Juliana Santos. “It’s time to get revenge.”
But while the Tigers may not have forgotten, that game seems like a distant memory. Since returning from Hattiesburg five weeks ago, LSU has won 16 of 20 games, including a weekend sweep of then-No.1 Alabama and a doubleheader sweep against then-No.25 Auburn.
“It’s a peace of mind from an ego standpoint in that you certainly don’t want your season to end without you going to the SEC tournament,” Girouard said.
Better for the Tigers’ confidence, in Girouard’s opinion, is that the wins have come with some setbacks. After toppling the Crimson Tide, LSU’s reward was a series with then-No. 6 Tennessee. The Volunteers swept the Tigers at Tiger Park to halt an 11-game winning streak, but the Tigers responded with a new win streak by sweeping Auburn and adding a weekend sweep of Ole Miss.
“You can tell when teams quit, and this team has not quit,” Girouard said. “We haven’t won all the games that we wanted to win, but when we got knocked down flat on our face, we got back up.”
Junior pitcher Brittany Mack said the Tigers’ rough road has helped them put their slump behind them. Since SEC play began, LSU has faced two different No. 1 teams in Alabama and Georgia, No. 2 Florida, No. 6 Tennessee, No. 24 Kentucky and No. 25 Auburn.
“We’ve definitely turned things around,” she said. “With this game [against Southern Miss] we kind of look at it is ‘Forget it. It never happened.’ We just need to turn around an win and show them who LSU is.”
 
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Contact David Helman at [email protected]