There are times when LSU sophomore right-handed pitcher Alex Lange looks unhittable on the mound, blowing 94 miles per hour fastballs by hitters or fooling them with a power breaking ball.
For example, take his eight-pitch first inning Saturday against Sacramento State, during which he cruised to a 1-2-3 inning with a pair of strikeouts. Or, take his 15-pitch fifth inning, where he worked through a leadoff walk to punch-out three more batters, totaling nine strikeouts during his Game 2 outing at Alex Box Stadium.
But, as LSU coach Paul Mainieri made clear, his Tigers (4-2) didn’t put the Hornets (4-2) away when they had a chance early. When Lange didn’t have his best stuff in the middle innings, allowing Sacramento State to narrow the deficit to one run, the LSU offense couldn’t respond after a four-run third inning.
“That’s two games [this season] we’ve had a chance to bury them early, left a runner on third base with one out, gave the other team momentum, and they rallied to come back in the game,” Mainieri said. “It happened in the second inning at Lamar and happened in the third inning today.”
With the window left open, the Hornets plated two runs in the top of ninth on an RBI single and RBI sacrifice fly to snatch a 5-4 victory from the Tigers.
LSU left runners in scoring position in the top of the first, third, fifth and seventh innings. In three of those frames, there was only one out, including runners on the corners in the bottom of the seventh.
With one out in the eighth inning, sophomore first baseman Greg Deichmann stood at third base with freshman third baseman O’Neal Lochridge stepping to the plate. But Deichmann was thrown out at home on Lochridge’s ground ball to the shortstop, erasing the Tigers’ final threat for an insurance run.
Despite a four-hit day from freshman right fielder Antoine Duplantis, LSU was 3-of-12 with runners in scoring position and 4-of-17 with runners on base.
Still, Maineri believes the end of the bottom of the third inning, where Deichmann struck out and sophomore catcher Michael Papierski grounded out, was the most detrimental offensively because his club didn’t strike while the iron was hot.
“No, that’s a product of a guy not coming through in the clutch for us,” Mainieri said when asked if the batting failures was a product on youth. “It’s just a part of baseball. Their pitcher beat our hitter at a time when we need our hitter to come through.
Lange looked on his way to another dominating performance, striking out three of the first five batters he faced. With two outs in the top of the second, Lange conceded a four-pitch walk to Sacramento State catcher Gunner Pollman, and shortstop Trent Goodrich followed with RBI double to take a 1-0 lead.
“I just kind of got out of myself,” Lange said. “When you get two quick outs in the second and you walk the three-hole hitters with two outs on four pitches, that’s going to beat you.”
Lange escaped a two-on, two-jam in the top of third with his third of five inning-ending strikeouts, but more trouble emerged from the leadoff hitter in the top of the fourth. Sophomore first baseman Vinny Esposito hammered the first pitch he saw from Lange into the seats in left field, which was only the fourth home run Lange has allowed in his career.
Then, Polllman doubled into left-center field on the next at-bat and later scored on RBI single from left fielder Andrew McWilliam. By the end of the frame, Lange had thrown 76 pitches.
After Lange struck out the side in the top of the fifth, Mainieri replaced Lange with junior reliever Hunter Newman, who fanned the side in order in top of the sixth. The 10th-year coach gave the ball to junior right-hander Riley Smith for top of the seventh, but he lasted just three hitters after two one-out singles.
Mainieri then called on freshman right-hander Caleb Gilbert, who escaped the one-out threat with a strikeout and pop out. Again in the top of the eighth, Gilbert faced runners on second and third with one out, partially due to an error by Deichmann on Pollman’s leadoff ground ball.
Sacramento State nine-hole hitter Bronson Grubbs attempted to lay down a squeeze bunt, but Gilbert fielded it and threw Pollman out at the plate for the second out. Gilbert then fanned McWilliam to end the inning, which was his third of five total strikeouts.
With LSU still clinging to a one-run lead, Hornet right fielder Chris Lewis drove a hard ground ball right at LSU shortstop Cole Freeman, but Freeman couldn’t make the play as the ball bounced into his midsection. Crouched over in pain, Freeman was replaced by freshman shortstop Trey Dawson for the rest of the inning.
“You got to have defense behind [Gilbert], too,” Mainieri said. “You got a routine ball in the eighth inning that was erred and forced him to throw a bunch of extra pitches. And then he gets a routine ball in the ninth inning, and we kicked it. Going into this season, I was very concerned about our infield defense, and today we didn’t make the plays when we needed to. It put a lot of pressure on [Gilbert].”
Gilbert couldn’t escape his final jam with no damage, allowing back-to-back singles to tie the game and then Esposito’s RBI sacrifice fly to give Sacramento State a 5-4 lead.
“I try to focus on the things I can control,” Gilbert said. “What I can control is getting on the mound, filling up the zone, executing pitches that are called. I felt like I did that for the most part, but it wasn’t good enough.”
“I take full responsibility for this loss,” Lange said. “I thought Caleb Gilbert threw one a heck of a game. He went out there, and he battled. This is on me. I got to be better than that.”