LSU Baseball Completes Series Sweep of Bethune-Cookman With 15-0 Win
It had been a while since Ma'Khail Hilliard had laid the grooves of his cleats on the mound. He was fine health wise but as the Tigers mixed up their rotations in Houston, Hilliard just wasn't left with an opportunity.
LSU came out red hot at the plate and Hilliard didn't skip a beat with his best performance of the season as the Tigers picked up a series sweep of Bethune-Cookman with a 15-0 win.
To go along with a fantastic offensive performance, the Tigers received a stellar pitching performance out of the senior Hilliard, who had not pitched in over two weeks for the team. Hilliard was about as close to perfect from a strike throwing, command and location perspective in his third appearance for LSU.
He didn't allow a single baserunner in the first 4.2 innings on the mound, retiring 14 straight with six strikeouts during that span. Though he doesn't have the velocity that some of the top end pitchers have in the SEC, there's a reason Hilliard has been a reliable starter at LSU and that's because of his pitch location and offspeed pitches that can throw off even the most consistent hitters.
For the afternoon, Hilliard would earn the win by going six innings, allowing just two hits and striking out six batters. Perhaps most impressive was that 59 of his 78 total pitches went for strikes.
"It was outstanding, exactly what we needed," Jay Johnson said. "Really not surprised, he was ready to pitch. It really lifted our team."
"In the game of baseball you get thrown surprises and I just made sure to keep myself mentally and physically ready," Hilliard said. "I felt like everything worked very well. Command was there and was able to throw off the balance of the hitters. Every single one of my pitches moves so being able to get that soft contact and strikeouts affected how the game went."
Getting a performance like this out of Hilliard is tremendous for LSU on a number of fronts with SEC play approaching, but more importantly the uncertainty around Blake Money's wrist injury. Both Hilliard and Ty Floyd responded well in their last non-conference performances, exuding some confidence they can be relied on at least in the short term as starting options.
The Tigers (13-3) were also guided by relentless offensive execution to attack and pull away from BCU in the first third of the game. By the third inning the Tigers had piled on 11 runs on 11 hits, with Dylan Crews, Brayden Jobert, Jordan Thompson and Giovanni DiGiacomo each picking up at least two RBI in the process.
In total, six players would record multiple hits, with Crews, DiGiacomo, Thompson and Cade Doughty leading the way with a combined 12 hits on the afternoon.
When a team is able to hit the way LSU's offense can, it's all about finding the positives in how the Tigers got there. This offense was really good in two out situations with all five runs in the first coming with two outs. In fact after those initial two outs of the game, the Tigers would put 12 of their next 13 batters on base, a definite positive sign even against an inferior opponent of capitalizing on opportunities.
"It's always good to see we're putting up a lot of runs and hits but we just take it day by day," Thompson said. "Every team we play is like a new playoff game for us. Just staying consistent with our approaches."
Riley Cooper, Cale Lansville and Trey Shaffer would come in out of the bullpen and continue the successful stretch by relief pitchers, tossing three scoreless innings to preserve a shutout.
LSU now heads into a midweek outing against top 25 Tulane followed by the first home SEC series of the season riding some great momentum at the plate and on the mound.
(Photo courtesy of LSUsports)