The LSU baseball team needed a big performance from its offense and pitching to get a win in Sunday’s rubber game at Tennessee. And that’s just what the Tigers got.
LSU scored eight runs in the second inning and pitcher Nate Bumstead pitched seven innings and allowed five hits and one run as the Tigers cruised to an 11-1 win over the Volunteers to take 2-of-3 in the series.
LSU (31-11, 10-8 Southeastern Conference) moved to within one game of Ole Miss (31-11, 11-7), which was swept by Georgia, for second place in the SEC Western Division. Arkansas leads the West with a 13-5 conference record after sweeping Kentucky.
Tennessee overcame six errors to win a wild Friday affair 8-6 while Saturday starter Clay Dirks and the Tigers won 11-5 in the second game. Right fielder Jon Zeringue homered and drove in four runs on a career-high four hits for the Tigers on Saturday.
Zeringue was the catalyst for the Tigers second-inning uprise against the Volunteers (31-11, 10-8) on Sunday.
Zeringue singled to open the inning and Clay Harris followed with a single of his own. Ivan Naccarata’s double scored Zeringue to put LSU ahead 1-0.
Nick Stavinoha walked to load the bases and Will Harris had an RBI-walk to make it 2-0.
Shortstop Derek Hebert followed with an RBI-single, and then center fielder J.C. Holt ripped a three-run double to left field to make it 6-0.
Holt scored on left fielder Ryan Patterson’s RBI-triple, and Patterson came around on an RBI-single from catcher Matt Liuzza for an 8-0 second inning lead. Holt finished the game 3-for-5 with three RBIs.
The Tigers pushed across a run in the fourth on a home run from Patterson to left field, and they scored two in the sixth on an RBI-double from Liuzza and an RBI-single from Clay Harris.
LSU had 15 hits on the afternoon, six of them for extra bases.
Tennessee starter Ben Riley (3-3) took the loss with eight runs allowed in just one inning of work.
With an early eight-run lead, it was just a matter of throwing strikes for Bumstead. The senior right hander improved to 6-2 and had one strikeout and no walks.
Freshman right-hander Michael Bonura pitched the final two innings with two strikeouts.
Saturday’s game saw the Tigers open a 3-0 lead before Tennessee rallied to take a 5-4 lead in the third inning. Three people were ejected in those first three innings, including LSU coach Smoke Laval and shortstop Derek Hebert for throwing his helmet. Vols catcher Nick Crow was ejected the previous inning for the same offense. Laval was ejected for arguing Hebert’s ejection.
The Tigers scored four runs in the top of the fifth and three in the seventh to put the game away. Will Harris also added a home run for LSU.
Dirks improved to 8-0 and allowed five runs in eight innings with only two earned runs.
Jason Determann (2-3) took the loss for the Tigers on Friday as the Vols got four runs and nine hits off the sophomore left-hander. Jordan Faircloth did not fair much better either allowing four runs in 1 2/3 innings.