BATON ROUGE — For the second consecutive day, an LSU pitcher notched a complete game shutout against Arkansas, as Brian Wilson blanked the Razorbacks on three hits, leading the Fighting Tigers to an 8-0 Southeastern Conference victory Saturday evening at Alex Box Stadium in front of a season-high paid crowd of 8,510.
The crowd is the second largest in the 64-year history of Alex Box Stadium, eclipsed only by the 8,622 that saw LSU down Louisiana-Lafayette on April 11, 2000.
The back-to-back shutouts are the first for LSU since March 26-27, 1996, when the Tigers defeated Southern 19-0 and McNeese St.16-0. The Tigers last posted back-to-back shutouts in SEC competition on April 12, 1986. when LSU swept a doubleheader at Mississippi State by identical 4-0 scores. LSU has not allowed a run since the sixth inning of Tuesday’s game at Louisiana-Monroe, a span of 21 2/3 innings.
LSU (29-15, 11-8) will go for its second sweep of an SEC series in the past three weeks Sunday at 1 p.m. No new inning in Sunday’s game will start later than 4:15 p.m. CDT so that Arkansas (23-17, 7-10) may catch its 6:30 flight out of Baton Rouge Metropolitan Airport.
Wilson, a sophomore right-hander from New Hampshire, had never gone past the seventh inning in any of his previous 35 outings, but he fought through four walks to pitch his first career complete game, throwing
The Tigers wasted little time in getting going, as J.C. Holt hit the first pitch in the bottom of the first from Arkansas’ Jarrett Gardner off the center field fence for an easy stand up triple, a hit that turned into a run on Aaron Hill’s first of two sacrifice flies in the game.
Following Hill’s sacrifice fly, Gardner would retire the next five batters, but he soon ran into trouble in the third when he gave up a leadoff single to David Raymer then yielded a two-run home run to Chris Phillips, a shot that tied Hill for the team lead with six.
Gardner would hit Holt following Phillips home run, and after a stolen base and a throwing error by Brady Toops put Holt on third, Hill lifted another sacrifice fly for a 4-0 LSU lead.
Gill would add an RBI triple in the fourth to score Matt Heath for a 5-0 LSU lead, then scored on a sacrifice fly by David Raymer. LSU would add two runs in the eighth on base hits by Dustin Hahn and Phillips.
Arkansas would have its first chance to score in the fifth when Nick Pitts doubled and Jeff Fletcher walked, but Toops grounded into an inning ending double play. The Razorbacks would get two runners on in the seventh thanks to a Ryan Fox double and a walk to Pitts, only to have the runners stranded when Fletcher grounded out.