LSU’s Mainieri wins 1,400th game
Tigers rally for six runs in 9th inning, beat Tennessee 9-7
{{tncms-inline content="<p class="p1" style="text-align: center;"><span class="s1"><strong>LSU </strong></span><span class="s1"><strong>9, </strong></span><span class="s1"><strong>Tennessee </strong></span><span class="s1"><strong>7</strong></span></p>" id="3b4a2aca-b026-4ca5-8c84-b794512734ae" style-type="quote" title="Pull Quote" type="relcontent"}}
<p class="p1">BATON ROUGE — A six-run ninth inning can cancel out a host of baseball sins.
<p class="p1">LSU proved that Sunday when Daniel Cabrera’s 3-run homer capped the unlikely, last-gasp six pack as the Tigers rallied for a 9-7 victory over Tennessee to complete a weekend sweep of the SEC series.
<p class="p1">LSU (24-13, 9-6 SEC) trailed 7-3 going into the bottom of the ninth.
<p class="p1">It was head coach Paul Mainieri’s 1,400th victory in his college career.
<p class="p1">But he’s never had one quite like this.
<p class="p1">“It’s just hard to put into words what we just witnessed today,” he said.
<p class="p1">The Tigers, who trailed 7-3 going to the bottom of the ninth, had won only one game since 1972 when trailing by four or more heading into the last inning — a streak of 303 games — and in that on lone victory in 2016 against Arkansas (the famed “rally possum” game) they only tied in the ninth and won in the 10th.
<p class="p1">This time Cabrera took out all the suspense with a towering, no-doubter home run to right field for LSU’s first walk-off home run since ince Chris Sciambra in the 2015 Baton Rouge Super Regional to beat UL-Lafayette.
<p class="p1">“We weren’t having a great game,” Mainieri said. “Things weren’t going our way, and then gosh, a never-say-die attitude can take you a long ways. What a special moment.”
<p class="p1">The Tigers fell behind 4-0 early but cut the gap to 4-3 in the fifth before a rash of defensive mishaps — including three errors by third baseman Jake Slaughter — helped Tennessee regain a 7-3 lead going into the bottom of the ninth.
<p class="p1">Four of the Vols’ runs were unearned and the Tigers also issued six walks.
<p class="p1">But it didn’t matter after the epic rally.
<p class="p1">Chris Reid led off the bottom of the ninth inning as a pinch hitter and reached on a Tennessee error. Beau Jordan followed with a single to put runners on the corners and beat an errant throw to second when Zach Watson reached safely on a ground ball that scored Reid.
<p class="p1">The Volunteers lifted starter Will Neely for Zach Linginfelter, who loaded the bases after hitting Antoine Duplantis with a pitch.
<p class="p1">Second baseman Austin Bain, who was warming up in the bullpen to pitch if LSU could tie it, then came in to rip a double to right-center on the first pitch he saw to drive in two runs and put the tying run at third base.
<p class="p1">Tennessee went back to the bullpen for right-hander Andrew Schultz, who got a strike out for the first out of the inning. But after taking the first pitch for a ball, Cabrera launched his game-winning, 3-run blast to right field.
<p class="p1">“I got all of it,” Cabrera said.
<p class="p1">Taylor Peterson (1-0) the last of seven LSU pitchers in Mainieri’s Sunday-by-committee mound plan, got the win after needing just one pitch to close the top of the ninth. The Tigers will travel to New Orleans Wednesday for a midweek contest against Tulane.
<p class="p1" style="text-align: center;"><span class="s1"><strong>LSU </strong></span><span class="s1"><strong>9, </strong></span><span class="s1"><strong>Tennessee </strong></span><span class="s1"><strong>7</strong></span>