The first game of the Southeastern Conference Tournament might not have gone as smoothly as No. 5 seed LSU would’ve liked.
The Tigers (40-17, 20-11 SEC) had to rally from behind to defeat a Tennessee team that they just swept a little more than week ago.
Defensive miscues and missed opportunities at the plate held the Tigers back from stringing together hits and gave the Tennessee offense life most of the game.
LSU had three runners thrown out at the plate and three defensive errors, with two from junior shortstop Kramer Robertson.
Tennessee (29-28, 9-22 SEC) freshman pitcher Will Neely stifled the LSU offense during his six-inning, five-hit performance.
The Tigers couldn’t get anything going offensively until the bottom of the seventh.
Trailing 4-0, first baseman Greg Deichmann was just one of the heroes for the Tigers tonight. His RBI double to center field cut into the Tennessee lead, making the score 4-1. A pair of RBI singles would reduce the Vols lead to 4-3.
After the Tigers went down in order in the bottom of the eighth, LSU was down to its last three outs and looked to have no hope. Deichmann would again come up clutch for the Tigers when he took a 2-2 pitch out of the park, notching things up to 4-4.
“Deichmann’s the real hero,” Robertson said on the SEC Network broadcast, after the game. “He hit a ball about 500 feet there to start the inning off. We don’t get to the point where we were without Greg. Just clutch up there. That’s as clutch as a home run you’ll ever see.
With runners on the corners and only one out, Robertson was in prime position to finish the LSU comeback. After missing two hittable pitches from Tennessee junior pitcher Hunter Martin, Robertson swung on a 2-2 pitch that barely stayed in play.
“I swung through two fastballs that were decent pitches to hit,” Robertson said. “So I was a little bit confused. I was kind of wondering what was wrong. I knew he was going to comeback with a fast one, he throws hard and it had a little sink. Fortunately, I was just barely able to keep it fair.”
LSU is rewarded with playing No. 4 Florida on Wednesday, who the Tigers took two out of three in the series, this past weekend.
