BATON ROUGE — Brian Bogusevic hurled eight-plus shutout innings, and Joey Charron recorded his fourth save of the season in a wild ninth inning as Tulane defeated LSU, 1-0, Tuesday night at Alex Box Stadium.
Tulane improved to 23-8 and evened the season series at one game apiece. LSU blanked the Green Wave on March 2 behind the superb effort of freshman lefty Clay Dirks.
The teams will meet again on Tuesday, April 27 at the Louisiana Superdome. Tickets can be purchased by calling LSU Ticket Office at 225.578.2184, or they may be purchased online at www.LSUsports.net.
The Tigers (24-6) continue Southeastern Conference play this weekend, hosting Arkansas in a three game series which begins Friday night at 6:30 p.m. The series continues Saturday at 2 p.m. (Fox Sports Net) and concludes Sunday at 1 p.m. (Cox Sports Television).
With the Wave holding a 1-0 lead into the ninth, a steady rain began to fall. Bogusevic got the first two hitters of the inning to go quietly as both J.C. Holt and Clay Harris grounded out.
Nick Stavinoha kept the Tigers’ hopes alive, lining a two-out base hit into center field, chasing Bogusevic from the game. Tulane coach Rick Jones then made the call to Charron, the senior southpaw, to finish the game. Jon Zeringue and Matt Liuzza drew back-to-back walks, loading the bases for Blake Gill.
Gill, 0-for-3 on the night, drew a 3-0 count, putting the pressure on Charron to hold the lead or risk walking in the tying run. The reliever came back to work the count to 3-2, and he then got Gill to ground out to first baseman Brian Bormaster.
Bogusevic earned his fifth victory of the season, holding LSU to four hits, — their lowest output of the season — while allowing no runs, no walks and striking out four. LSU also collected just four hits in Sunday’s 3-2 win over Auburn.
Two of the four hits came off of the bat of Ryan Patterson, who went 2-for-4 and collected his 12th multi-hit game of the season.
Jason Determann (2-1) suffered the first loss of his career despite pitching superbly in six innings. The sophomore lefty allowed one run on six hits and struck out three.
“It just seems like we didn’t have the intensity that we usually carry,” said Determann. “Our guys should really get up for a game like Tulane, but we just seemed to lack focus. I think that could have been the difference.”
The lone run of the game came in the top of the sixth when Nathan Southard doubled to lead off the frame. Two batters later, Matt Barket dropped a single into center field, scoring Southard for a 1-0 lead the Wave would not relinquish.
The 1-0 Tulane victory marked the first time the Tigers dropped a mid-week game this season and it marked the first shutout by an opposing team since Mississippi State blanked LSU, 5-0, on May 3, 2003.
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Tulane………….. 000 001 000 – 1 7 0 (23-8)
LSU…………….. 000 000 000 – 0 4 1 (24-6)
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Pitchers: Tulane – Bogusevic; Charron(9). LSU – Determann; Mestepey(7); Faircloth(9).
Win-Bogusevic(5-2)
Save-Charron(4)
Loss-Determann(2-1)
T-2:32
A-7840