By Drew Parsley, Louisiana Tech Associate Director Strategic Communications; featured photo by Chase McGough
RUSTON — Louisiana Tech (9-6) fell to South Alabama (8-6) in Game 2 of the weekend series on Saturday, 9-0, at the Love Shack. It was LA Tech’s first time getting shut out at home since the 2023 season.
Pitching and defense for the Jaguars was the story of the game, as South Alabama’s starting pitcher tossed seven shutout innings allowing just two hits and two walks with five strikeouts. The Bulldogs were just 1-12 with runners on base and 0-5 with runners in scoring position.
After two frames of shutout baseball on both sides of the field, South Alabama struck the scoreboard first after a pair of doubles and an RBI infield hit made it 1-0. The Jaguars extended their lead the next inning when double and a two-run single made it 4-0.
A solo homer in the sixth increased South Alabama’s advantage to five before firing off four more runs in the eighth. A leadoff double and a sacrifice bunt gave the Jaguars a chance to add on, for which an RBI knock the next at-bat made it happen. A four-pitch walk put runners on first and second with one out when a double was hit to center field over the Bulldog center fielder.
Garrison Berkley picked up the ball from the warning track and fired a relay to second baseman Michael Ballard. Ballard quickly turned and hit Eli Berch in the perfect spot to tag the lead runner out at home. After a pitching change was made, South Alabama tagged on two more runs before an unearned run on an error sealed Saturday’s contest.
Luke Cooley took his first loss of the season, allowing four runs through 3 2/3 innings yet struck out six batters. The junior righty has a team-high 24 strikeouts through 18 1/3 innings on the mound.
First pitch for the rubber match is set for 1 p.m. CT on Sunday, March 8 at the Love Shack.
Head Coach Lane Burroughs on Saturday’s game:
“Disappointed, obviously, in the effort—not the score and all that. Just the competitiveness I didn’t feel like was there today. It’s disappointing because we’ve been playing good, and I guess we’re back to square one trying to figure out who we are. Tried to play a different lineup against a lefty. I thought their guy was really good, as advertised he pitched good. I will not take anything away from him. He was very good. Disappointing thing to me is [we] continued to get out the same way over and over and over again. If you’re watching the game and paying attention and you see the guy in front of you get out one way, and you go up there and you do the exact same thing—the same pitches, the same pattern. It was maddening to watch us continue to just pop balls up, take weak swings. We just have to be better. I didn’t think Luke Cooley was bad at all. He had [six] punchouts and I thought he was throwing the ball really good. Credit to South Alabama, what they did as they fouled pitches off. They spoiled pitches and he ended up striking out [six] guys, so his pitch count got up, we had to get him out of there. The only reason we got their guy’s pitch count up is because we started taking pitches—in the fourth inning we started taking a strike and he knew it. We had better at-bats, but it’s just disappointing the way we played, and I just didn’t feel like we competed very hard at all. We have to find out a way to regroup. One thing this program has always done is respond but I asked our guys, ‘Who are we?’, and I think we have some tough-minded kids and kids that want to win, but we’ll find out. We need to come out and find a way to win this series and if that happens, all is forgotten. You move on. But right now–coming off the ninth inning last night and today, we didn’t make it very hard on them and that’s the most disappointing part.”
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