BATON ROUGE — Five Central Florida errors — including four by two different third basemen — led to four LSU runs Friday night and gave the Tigers a 4-1 victory in the opening contest of a three-game series at Alex Box Stadium.
LSU (6-2) tallied double digits in hits for the third straight contest as the Tigers won their third consecutive game.
The Golden Knights (3-6) lost their fourth straight series-opening game. UCF entered the weekend with 21 errors in eight contests, and the Golden Knights committed five errors for the third time in four games.
LSU senior left-hander Clay Dirks is scheduled to make his first start of the season in Game 2 of the series at noon Saturday. Live audio and streaming video for Saturday’s contest are available in the Geaux Zone on www.LSUsports.net.
Junior southpaw Charlie Furbush (2-1) rebounded from a tough outing last weekend at Stetson with seven strong innings Friday. Furbush allowed only four hits and one run while walking two and striking out seven. His only blemish came on a solo homer in the fifth.
“I pitched well,” said Furbush. “I got in a rhythm from the get-go. It was kind of hard last weekend because I could never get in a groove.”
Freshman centerfielder Jared Mitchell tallied his third straight multi-hit game with two singles, and the Tigers’ eight and nine-hole hitters — right fielder Steven Waguespack and shortstop Michael Hollander — were once again productive with two hits apiece.
Second baseman Buzzy Haydel provided LSU’s lone RBI with a clutch two-out single in the eighth as none of UCF’s three pitchers allowed an earned run.
Sophomore left-hander Mitch Houck (0-2) absorbed the loss, allowing six hits and two unearned runs in 4.2 innings of work.
“I expected this to be a low-scoring, tight ballgame,” said LSU head coach Paul Mainieri. “We were facing their No. 1 starter. He threw it hard enough to make it a challenge. In the opening game of a series, you have to assume you are going to face a good pitcher, and the runs are going to be hard to come by.”
The Tigers looked to be out to an early lead in the first when the first two batters reached base. Haydel walked and moved to third on a single by Mitchell. The Golden Knights then made an excellent defensive play when left fielder Ryan Williams made a diving catch on designated hitter Jason Lewis‘ shallow fly.
However, a defensive miscue by UCF sparked LSU to a 1-0 lead in the second. Third baseman J.T. Wise and Waguespack each singled. Hollander followed with a grounder to third baseman Chris Duffy, who misplayed the ball allowing Wise to score.
Meanwhile, Furbush was unhittable through three innings. The southpaw quickly made work of the first two batters in the fourth with back-to-back strikeouts before issuing a hard-luck single to designated hitter Matt Horwath on a grounder back to the mound.
UCF tied the game at one apiece on a homer into the left field bleachers by shortstop Eric Kallstrom to start the fifth. After allowing only two hits through four innings of work, Furbush allowed a single to Williams following the homer. But Furbush worked his way out of the frame with the aid of a 6-4-3 double play.
He retired the last seven batters he faced before giving way to junior right-hander Jared Bradford, who worked the final two innings.
Another error in the fifth put LSU back in front, 2-1. Hollander provided a leadoff double into the corner and advanced to third on a groundout. The shortstop was then tagged out at home while attempting to score on a dropped ball by the catcher.
Mitchell and left fielder Blake Dean collected back-to-back singles, and first baseman Sean Ochinko chopped a grounder to third that was misplayed by Kyle Maulbetsch, the Golden Knights’ second third baseman on the evening.
Mitchell came into score, but LSU failed to capitalize on the error further when Lewis grounded out to second.
Maulbetsch’s second error sparked the Tigers to two insurance runs in the eighth. He misplayed a pop-up off of Hollander’s bat, allowing Waguespack to score from second.
Haydel further capitalized on the miscue with a single through the middle to score Hollander, who stole second after the error.
Bradford worked two perfect innings to qualify for his second save behind a dominating sinker to the opposing UCF batters.
“I was very prepared to use Bradford if we needed to, and we needed to,” said Mainieri. “He did the job for us and we won.”
LSU 4, Central Florida 1 (Feb 23, 2007 at Baton Rouge, La.)
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Central Florida….. 000 010 000 – 1 4 5 (3-6)
LSU…………………. 010 010 02X – 4 10 2 (6-2)
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Pitchers: Central Florida – Mitch Houck; Austin Hudson(5); Justin Weiss(8). LSU –
Charlie Furbush; Jared Bradford(8).
Win-Charlie Furbush(2-1) Save-Jared Bradford(2) Loss-Mitch Houck(0-2) T-2:30 A-7376
HR UCF – Eric Kallstrom (1).
Actual attendance: 3,720