Bengals falter Thursday, face elimination game Friday night
Box Score
The LSU Eunice baseball team left 12 men stranded on the base paths throughout the night as they fell 8-2 to Madison College Thursday night, setting up an elimination contest Friday night between the same teams for the right to go to the NJCAA Division II National Championship game.
Tomorrow’s game will be a 7 p.m. start between the Bengals and the Wolfpack, with the winner moving on to face Murray State College on Saturday night for the championship.
The Bengals (51-9) took an early lead on Tyler Chapman’s solo home run in the top of the second inning, but Madison (43-12) responded with three runs in the bottom of the second before adding a single run in the fourth and two runs in both the sixth and eighth innings.
LSU Eunice added a single run in the top of the seventh but that was as close as the game would come.
The Bengals finished with nine total hits, with seven of those hits coming from three players – Buddy McCoy (three hits), Adam Angelle (two hits) and Garrett Deschamp (two hits, double).
Casey Rodrigue and Chapman added the final two hits.
LSU Eunice left two men on base to end the first, fourth, fifth and eighth innings, including getting the first two men on in the fourth and eighth before they were stranded.
Bengal starter Kirk Savoy was saddled with the loss, tossing 3 2/3 innings and allowing four runs on seven hits, before Gerry Gonzales finished the final 4 1/3 innings of the night, allowing four runs on five hits.
After Chapman’s solo homer in the second, the Bengals only other run came in the seventh when Rodrigue opened the inning with a single before moving around the bases and scoring on McCoy’s sacrifice fly later in the frame.
Tomorrow’s game can be seen for free on NJCAA TV and heard over the airwaves on KVPI 92.5 FM.
