BATON ROUGE — Matt Heath’s one-out home run in the bottom of the 11th gave LSU its only lead of the game, but it was enough to lift the Fighting Tigers (10-4) to a 5-4 victory over Long Beach State (7-6) in the rubber game of a three-game set on a frigid Sunday afternoon at Alex Box Stadium.
LSU (No. 7 ESPN/Baseball Weekly, No. 8 Collegiate Baseball, No. 9 Baseball America) renews its oldest athletic rivalry Tuesday night when it hosts Tulane at 6:30 p.m. The Tigers own a 151-114-3 lead in the 109-year old series, although the Green Wave won four of five meetings last year. The two teams met in an NCAA super regional series at Zephyr Field in suburban New Orleans last June, with the Green Wave taking a 2-1 victory to advance to the College World Series for the first time.
Heath, the Tigers’ senior left fielder, ended a contest that is believed to be the coldest home baseball game in LSU’s 109-year history. The temperature at game time was 31 degrees, with the wind blowing out of the north at 20 MPH for a wind chill of 19 degrees. The temperature never warmed to the 40-degree mark despite the fact the sun broke through the clouds in the seventh inning.
Prior to Heath’s blast, Long Beach reliever Josh Alliston (1-1) was nearly unhittable, striking out six of the first 11 batters he faced. The only other hit he allowed besides the home run was Blake Gill’s double in the eighth.
Long Beach took a 1-0 lead in the first on an error by Heath that allowed Nick Covarubbias to score from second. Covarubbias was hit by a pitch from Jake Tompkins and had gone to second on Jeremy Reed’s single. Heath fielded Reed’s hit and threw the ball into the LSU dugout.
Covarubbais gave the 49ers a 2-0 lead in the third when he singled home Nick Orlandos, and Reed’s ground ball that was booted by Gill scored Kevin Randel.
LSU scored a run without a hit in the third as three consecutive walks led to an RBI ground ball by Jason Vargas, but the Tigers would not get a hit off of Long Beach pitcher Jered Weaver until Wally Pontiff’s single in the fifth.
The Tigers tied the game in the sixth, as Heath’s double just over the glove of 49er first baseman Mike Hofius scored Vargas, and Heath would tie the game when he crossed the plate on a Weaver wild pitch.
Covarubbias’ RBI single gave the 49ers a 4-3 lead in the top of the 7th, but the lead would evaporate when David Raymer led off the LSU seventh with a home run.
Tompkins, making his first start in two weeks, gave up 12 hits but did not walk a batter and struck out eight over eight innings. Tiger reliever Brian Wilson gave up only two hits in three scoreless innings of relief to improve to 3-1.