BATON ROUGE — A solid pitching performance by Britni Sneed and Ashley Lewis with the support of productive Tiger bats were what the fifth ranked LSU softball team needed to shutdown New Mexico State in Tiger Park, 7-0, on Thursday night.
“Once we woke up in the fourth, it was a lot of fun,” said head coach Yvette Girouard. “That’s six home runs in two games. Our hitting coach is very happy. It also allows the pitchers to relax and throw a good game. We just had a lot of fun tonight.”
LSU improves to 44-8 overall as New Mexico State falls to 20-39.
Thursday night’s game will be replayed Friday by College Sports Southeast on Cable Channel 18 in Baton Rouge at 2 p.m.
It took the Tigers three innings to adjust to the Aggies’ pitching, and in the fourth inning the bats began to make connection. April Janzen got things started with a solid hit up the middle. Senior Stephanie Hastings laid down an unexpected bunt single, and the third baseman Mel Briggs over threw first allowing Janzen to score from second and Hastings to advance to third. Trena Peel extended her hitting streak to six games with an RBI single up the middle to send Hastings across the plate. Peel later scored when Julie Wiese reached first on an error by the second baseman Jennifer Lozano.
The Tigers broke loose with four runs on four hits in the fifth inning, three of which were home runs. Hastings hit her second home run of the season to get the fifth started for LSU. Christy Connor reached first with a single to left center, and Peel followed with a blast over the center field wall to score herself and pinch runner Sara Fitzgerald. Wiese came through with theTigers’ third blast of the inning to put LSU up 7-0.
The Tigers had eight hits off Aggie pitcher Ryon Adams. Hastings and Peel were each two-for-three with homers. Peel hit her sixth of the season.
Wiese is now one home run away from tying the LSU single season record of 12 home runs.
Junior Sneed improves to 27-5 overall with the win. She worked five innings for the Tigers, striking out 10 to run her season-record total to 289. Sneed only allowed one hit and walked one. She has not allowed a run at home in Tiger Park in 87.1 innings of work. The Tigers have outscored opponents 138-8 this season.
Senior Lewis came into the game in the sixth inning. She struck out two and did not allow a hit.
LSU returns to Southeastern Conference action against Ole Miss on Saturday and Sunday for the final regular-season home games in Tiger Park. Saturday’s start time has been moved up to 11 a.m. to encourage tailgaters to attend before heading over to the Spring Football Game.
The LSU softball parents will be honored between games on Saturday, and the Tigers will honor five seniors before Sunday’s noon start. Dee Douglas, Stephanie Hastings, Ashley Lewis, Jennifer Schuelke and Auburne Ziober are the 2001 Tiger seniors.