BATON ROUGE — Senior right-hander Nate Bumstead pitched LSU’s second complete game in as many days and the Tiger bats came alive in the final two innings of the game, as top-seeded LSU came back to defeat No. 2 seed Southern Mississippi on Saturday in the 2004 NCAA Baton Rouge Regional in front of 6,775 at Alex Box Stadium.
LSU (43-17) moved into Sunday’s championship round at 1 p.m. and will face the winner of Saturday night’s 7:30 p.m. game between Southern Miss and College of Charleston, who was a 2-1 winner over Army on Saturday morning. The loser of Saturday night’s ballgame will be eliminated from the regional. Southern Miss fell to 45-18 with the loss.
The Tigers won their sixth-straight regional game, and must be beaten twice on Sunday. If LSU loses Sunday’s first game, then a second game will be played at 5 p.m. The winner of the regional moves on to face the winner of the Houston Regional next weekend.
Bumstead improved to 10-3 with the complete-game win, as he allowed just two runs and eight hits. He walked just two while striking out six. LSU has now tossed three-consecutive complete games this season as Lane Mestepey lost a 1-0 heartbreaker on May 27 in the SEC Tournament and Justin Meier went all nine innings in Friday’s 9-0 win over Army. Southern Miss starter Anthony DeWitt took the loss, falling to 10-3, as he pitched 6 1/3 innings, allowing five runs on six hits.
Play was stopped at 3:29 p.m. due to lightning in the immediate area surrounding the stadium, but the game was halted for just a short time as the game resumed at 3:44 p.m.
First-baseman Marc Maddox put the Golden Eagles on the board first as he sent Bumstead’s 2-0 pitch into the seats in left for his 15th homerun of the season in the top of the third, putting Southern Miss ahead 1-0.
Bumstead escaped a jam in the following inning, as Southern Miss put runners on second and third with only one out, but the right-hander got Jason Lowery to fly out to right, and then induced a groundout to shortstop off the bat of Jody Blount to end the frame.
Right-fielder Jon Zeringue evened the score in the bottom half of the fourth inning, as the junior launched DeWitt’s 1-1 offering into the bleachers in left center. The homerun was Zeringue’s 12th of the season and first since hitting one in an 11-5 win at Tennessee on April 24.
Southern Miss regained the lead in the fifth on a run-scoring double by second baseman Jarrett Hoffpauir with two outs, scoring Beau Griffin from second. Griffin walked to lead off the inning and was sacrificed to second by leadoff hitter Matt Shepherd. Maddox then grounded out to first but Hoffpauir rifled a line drive over the head of LSU third-baseman Clay Harris to put the Eagles up 2-1.
The Tigers took the lead for the first time in the seventh inning as Clay Harris singled up the middle on a 2-2 pitch, driving in both Nick Stavinoha and catcher Matt Liuzza to put LSU ahead 3-2. First-baseman Will Harris followed with what appeared to be a two-run homerun to left-centerfield, but was then ruled it a double, which scored Clay Harris, extending LSU’s lead to 4-2. The ball appeared to clear the wall and hit off of the clear fence above the outfield signage, but the call stood as a double.
John Nicholas then relieved DeWitt and promptly walked J.C. Holt. He then threw ball one to Tiger left-fielder Ryan Patterson and was removed in favor of right-hander Adam Smith. Patterson was retired on a liner to right-center, but Blake Gill followed him with an RBI single up the middle to extend the Tigers’ lead to 5-2. Gill extended his hitting steak to 10 games with his seventh-inning single, the longest current streak on the team.
The game took the flavor of an old-fashioned pitching duel from early on until the seventh inning as the teams combined for just eight hits and three runs through the first six innings. LSU then erupted for five runs on five hits in the seventh and eighth innings to put the game away.
Stavinoha doubled to lead off the seventh and after Ivan Naccarata flew out, Liuzza drew a walk. The runners each moved up a base after a wild pitch, and then came home on Harris’ hit. Stavinoha led off the eighth with another double, this time of Southern Miss’ third reliever, Daniel Best, and later scored on a wild pitch to make it 6-2.
Stavinoha led LSU with three hits, while Will Harris recorded a multi-hit game for the second day in a row with a double and a single. Ryan Frith and Hoffpauir each had two hits to lead Southern Miss.
LSU, winners of eight-straight regional titles, will look to advance to Super-Regional play for the sixth year in a row. The Tigers defeated UNC-Wilmington 9-8 in 11 innings to win last season’s regional in Baton Rouge.
LSU 6, Southern Mississippi 2 (Jun 05, 2004 at Baton Rouge, La.)
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Southern Mississippi 001 010 000 – 2 8 0 (45-18)
LSU…………….. 000 100 41X – 6 8 1 (43-17)
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Pitchers: Southern Mississippi – DeWitt; Nicholas(7); Smith(7); Best(8). LSU – Bumstead.
Win-Bumstead(10-3) Loss-DeWitt(10-3) T-2:12 A-6775
HR SMS – Maddox (15).
HR LSU – Zeringue (12).
Game notes:
Lightning delay for 15 minutes with one out in bottom of second.
Paid attendance: 7,638.