by Chris Macaluso,
Special to www.LSUsports.net
BATON ROUGE — LSU sophomore right-hander Justin Meier scattered seven hits over nine innings en route to recording his first career complete game shut out and advancing the Tigers to the winners’ bracket of the NCAA Baton Rouge Regional with a 9-0 victory over the Army Black Knights.
LSU, representing the Southeastern Conference, improved its record to 42-17 on the year while Army, representing the Patriot League, fell to 37-13 overall.
The Tigers advance to play the winner of tonight’s contest between the College of Charleston and Southern Mississippi tomorrow afternoon at approximately 3 p.m. Army plays the loser of tonight’s game tomorrow at 11:00 a.m.
Meier, who improved to 6-2, struggled with his control early in the game giving Army scoring chances in two of the first four innings. The Tiger starter hit four Black Knight hitters during the game but helped his cause tremendously by not walking a batter and striking out a career-high nine.
His last complete game came in last season’s Baton Rouge Super Regional in a 20-5 win over Baylor that sent LSU to the College World Series.
The potent LSU offense pounded 15 hits off five Army pitchers, including 11 off of Black Knight starter Nick Hill who entered the contest with an impressive 10-2 record and 2.24 ERA. Hill had surrendered just 53 hits in 80.1 innings before Friday’s contest.
LSU threatened to score in the bottom of the first after a two-out walk to catcher Matt Liuzza and a single by rightfielder John Zeringue put runners on the corners. But designated hitter Nick Stavinoha stranded the two by grounding into a 6-4 fielder’s choice for the third out.
Army answered LSU’s threat with a two out stirring of its own in the top of the second. Meier hit Black Knight designated hitter Nick Cork with a 2-0 pitch that was followed by a sharp single up the middle by third baseman Jeremy Stache.
The threat ended with runners at first and second when nine-hole hitter Kyle Scogin grounded out to first base.
The Tigers put two runners on base with two outs again in the bottom of the second after a single by first baseman Will Harris and a walk by shortstop Blake Gill.
Harris was picked of second, however taking away J.C. Holt’s chance at his 44th RBI of the season. Holt entered Friday’s contest batting .500 with runners in scoring position this year.
Holt grounded out to start the third but Ryan Patterson and Matt Liuzza followed with singles putting runners at first and second with one out. Zeringue then bounced a fielder’s choice to second moving Patterson to third. But the Tiger scoring threat was halted for the third straight inning when Stavinoha flied out to shallow center.
The Black Knights loaded the bases with two outs in the top of the fourth but stayed with the theme of the first three and a half innings and stranded those three runners as well. Meier struck out Scogin on a 3-2 fastball after giving up a double, hitting Cork for the second time and then surrendering another single to Stache.
LSU finally capitalized in the bottom of the fourth when Gill launched a one-out triple to the wall in right- center field scoring Naccarata and Will Harris who both singled ahead of him. Holt followed Gill’s shot with a single just past a diving Scogin at shortstop to give the Tigers a 3-0 advantage. Holt’s hit was his 32 in 63 at bats with runners in scoring position this season.
Army picked up a base hit in each of the next two innings but were unable to mount any sort of scoring threat as Meier mixed pitches well, hitting the corners of the plate with both his fastball and a sharp curve ball keeping the Black Knight batters off balance.
The Black Knights moved a runner to third base for the second time off Meier in the seventh after the Tiger starter hit Scogin in the left wrist to lead off the inning. Lead-off hitter Wes Bumgardner laid down a sacrifice bunt to move Scogin to second and Milan Dinga drove a fly ball to the wall in right field moving the runner to third on a tag up. But again, the two-out Army threat ended unsuccessfully as Schuyler Williamson flied out weakly to Zeringue to end the inning.
The Tigers finally chased Hill from the game in the bottom of the seventh after he gave up back-to-back singles to Liuzza and Zeringue with one out.
LSU put the game out of reach later in the inning with the help of a costly Army error. Stavinoha grounded a 0-2 pitch to Stache at third base for what could have been an inning-ending double play. But, Stache dropped the two-hopper allowing Liuzza and Zeringue to advance and Stavinoha to reach first. Clay Harris followed the error with a bases-loaded walk off reliever Dan Pluff who was replaced after the free pass by fellow reliever Brad Johnson. Johnson balked home Liuzza then gave up a two-run single to Naccarata, staking the Tigers to a 7-0 lead.
The Tigers picked up three singles and added two more runs in the bottom of the eighth to extend the lead to 9-0.
LSU 9, Army 0 (Jun 04, 2004 at Baton Rouge, La.)
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Army……………. 000 000 000 – 0 7 2 (37-14)
LSU…………….. 000 300 42X – 9 15 0 (42-17)
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Pitchers: Army – Hill, N; Pluff, D(7); Johnson, B(7); Brannon, L(8); Jones, M(8). LSU – Meier.
Win-Meier(6-2) Loss-Hill, N(10-3) T-2:51 A-6032
Game notes:
Paid attendance: 7,601
LSU will play Southern Miss/Coll. of Charleston winner at 3 p.m.
Army will play Southern Miss/Coll. of Charleston loser at 11 a.m.
Pluff, D faced 2 batters in the 7th.
Brannon, L faced 3 batters in the 8th.