By RON HIGGINS, Journal Sports
BATON ROUGE – If he wasn’t before Monday night, Louisiana native Ethan Frey became the biggest celebrity from a tiny dot on a map of the Pelican State.
Frey, LSU’s junior designated hitter and the pride of little ’ol Rosepine (population 1,459) in Vernon Parish, drove in four runs including a bases-clearing fourth-inning double that ignited the Tigers’ 10-6 comeback victory over unheralded Arkansas-Little Rock to win the NCAA Baton Rouge Regional.
An emotionally spent Alex Box Stadium crowd of 11,656 practically willed No. 6 national seed LSU (46-15) back from a 5-1 second-inning deficit against the Cinderella Trojans (27-34), the only school in the 64-team field with a losing record.
It wasn’t until the rest of the Tigers’ bats led by catcher Luis Hernandez’s two solo homers and freshman reliever Casan Evans simultaneously caught fire, that LSU believed there was more baseball in its future.
Only when LSU first baseman Jared Jones broke a 3 for 26 slump with a two-run homer in the ninth inning did the Tigers look ahead to hosting a Super Regional vs. Clemson Regional winner West Virginia (44-14) likely starting Saturday.
“I told the team this is one of the best wins in my entire career because what they had to do to earn it,” LSU head coach Jay Johnson. “We won tonight because of character.
“Ethan’s offensive performance is arguably the best game I’ve seen any of my players play. Luis was absolutely clutch, catching four games in a row and maintaining offensive production. This dude (Evans) is a superstar. There haven’t been very many better performances on that pitcher’s mound in championship games.”
Frey, who batted .375 (6 for 16 including five extra base hits) in four regional games and had six RBI and scored five runs in four regional games, led a group of seven Tigers voted to the regional all-tournament team.
“Coach Johnson talks about controlling the situation, not letting the moment get too big,” Frey said.
If there had been an award for the most clutch performance, Evans would have walked away with it. Taking over for starter Zac Cowan with one out in the second inning, Evans allowed two hits, struck out 12, and walked three in holding UALR scoreless for six innings.
In the midst of Evans striking out nine straight batters at one point, LSU tied the game at 5-5 on Hernandez’s sixth-inning solo homer and grabbed the lead for good at 6-5 on shortstop Steven Milam’s RBI grounder in the seventh.
“Hands down, it was one of the best performances I’ve had this year and in my career,” Evans said. “Coach Johnson threw me in the game with runners on, and I was just going to right at him (the first batter).”
Evans’ biggest pitch of the night came after he loaded the bases with three walks in the bottom of the seventh. He struck out UALR’s Cooper Chaplain to end the inning.
“He (Evans) was nasty, man,” said Trojans’ first baseman Angel Cano, who was voted the Most Outstanding Player of the regional. “He was finishing and spinning it really good.”
Hernandez then stepped up and launched his second solo homer with one out in the top of the eighth to edge the Tigers’ lead to 7-5 and turn up the “LSU, LSU” chants from the Purple and Gold faithful.
When the Tigers left two runners on base to end the inning, it opened the door for a possible UALR rally.
Evans started the bottom of the eighth by giving up consecutive singles to Cano and right fielder Sammy Harris before Evans got a force out at third base on left fielder Reed Willbanks’ sacrifice bunt
Johnson then rolled the dice, pulled a tired Evans after 109 pitches. He brought in Anthony Eyanson, who started and threw a 7-0 shutout over UALR in Friday’s regional opening win.
UALR shortstop Alex Seguine immediately tagged Eyerson for an RBI single to reduce LSU’s margin to a run. Then, Eyanson battled back from a 3-0 count to strike out Trojans’ centerfielder Zach Henry and induced a ground out to LSU backup third baseman Tanner Reaves to escape the inning.
In their final at-bats in the ninth, the Tigers provided Eyanson with three insurance runs, starting with Jones’ two-run blast into the night over the centerfield wall.
In winning their 27th regional championship and their 24th at home, the Tigers avoided being eliminated, like fellow SEC NCAA tournament top 10 national seeds and regional hosts Vanderbilt (No. 1), Texas (No. 2), Georgia (No. 7), and Ole Miss (No. 10).
“To a man, they (LSU’s players) were not going to let each other lose tonight in a way that you don’t see very often,” Johnson said. “They fully believed they could do it. There was no panic.”
Arkansas-Little Rock, which beat LSU 10-4 on Sunday night to set up Monday’s winner-take-all showdown, had nothing to hang its head about.
The Trojans, losers of their last 13 of 14 regular season games before winning five games in five days to capture the Ohio Valley Conference and an automatic NCAA tourney bid, captured their first-ever three NCAA tournament wins.
“It hurts right now because we don’t like to lose and we’re competitors,” teary-eyed UALR head coach Chris Curry said. “But these men changed Little Rock baseball forever. Little Rock baseball took a step forward this year. The expectation and standard are to be playing in June. You’ve got to get to a regional before you learn how to win it.”
Contact Ron at ronhigginsmedia@gmail.com