LSU baseball desperately needed someone to step up, staring down a potentially embarrassing exit from its home regional.
With starter Zac Cowan leaving after just four outs and five runs allowed, freshman Casan Evans took the ball out of an exhausted LSU bullpen and pitched the game of his life to allow a Tigers rally and 10-6 win to advance to the Super Regionals.
“You never know who becomes the man when you need it," Mike Detillier said on SportsTalk, "but they needed a fireman last night ... and Casan Evans became the fireman.”
Hear the full breakdown from Mike Detillier in the player above. Can't see the embed? Click here.
Evans went six innings and struck out 12, both career highs, including a stretch of nine consecutive strikeouts as Little Rock failed to pad its lead as it had a night earlier in a 10-4 win that forced Monday's winner-take-all action. Evans allowed just one run that crossed the plate with Anthony Eyanson on the mound, taking over to close things out after getting the start in Game 1.
The performance by Evans was much needed, but likely didn't surprise head coach Jay Johnson, who's made it clear in the past he sees the young right-hander as a future ace of his staff.
“Jay has made the comment, next year he's gonna be my guy, he’s the gonna be THE guy on this pitching staff," Detillier continued. Well, last night he was the guy.”
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LSU methodically marched back in the game largely powered by the longball, with Ethan Frey launching a 3-run home run, Jared Jones a two-run shot, and Luis Hernandez a pair of solo home runs.
The weekend certainly could've gone smoother after a pair of shutout wins to start regional play, but in the end the Tigers get exactly where they wanted, and that's a return to Alex Box Stadium this weekend for a Super Regional showdown with the West Virginia Mountaineers, who won the Clemson regional and took down an SEC foe in Kentucky to advance.
“At the end it really doesn't matter. You’ve got to win," Detillier said. "They’re not giving you style points for none of this and you’ve got to give Little Rock a lot of credit, too. Man, they don’t have a fraction of the talent LSU does baseball-wise, but they hung in there like grim death and they fought to the bitter end with it. They just sort of ran out of steam at the end and, you know, there’s always other heroes there.”
The Tigers and Mountaineers begin their series Saturday afternoon (1 p.m. scheduled first pitch), followed by a 5 p.m. first pitch on Sunday. An if necessary Game 3 is set for Monday, though a time is TBD. You can catch all the action on WWL AM-870; FM-105.3 and the free Audacy app.