BATON ROUGE, La. – Utah Valley University came up short in its first NCAA Tournament contest, falling 7-1 to No. 8 National seed LSU on Friday at Alex Box Stadium. The game was delayed by six and a half hours due to rain and lightning.
The paid attendance for Friday's game was 9,770, the largest crowd ever for a Utah Valley game in the program's NCAA DI history.
Craig Brinkerhoff and
Mark Krueger had two hits apiece for the Wolverines (37-22) while Greg Deichmann had two hits and drove in three runs. Deichmann and Jake Fraley both hit two-run home runs for the Tigers (43-18).
"Well you have to give LSU a lot of credit, they're a good club," said UVU head coach
Eric Madsen. "I'm very disappointed. I didn't feel that we played as well as we're capable of. Too many of our early opportunities ended in strikeouts. I really think we're a better club than what we showed tonight, but again you have to give LSU a lot of credit. They are very talented."
Fraley's home run put LSU on top in the first with a no doubter to right to start the scoring. Krueger led off the top of the second with a base hit, Utah Valley's first hit of the game and the first in program history in the NCAA Tournament. After he moved to second on a wild pitch,
Justin Erlandson drove in UVU's lone run with a double into the left field corner.
Trailing 4-1 in the fourth, Brinkerhoff led off the inning with a double to the wall in left-center and moved to third on a Krueger's second hit of the night. LSU starter Jared Poche´ struck out the next three batters to end the threat and keep the lead at three.
Poche´ retired nine of the final 10 hitters and finished with six innings pitched, allowing one run on five hits. He tied a season high with eight strikeouts without allowing a walk for the Tigers to move to 8-4 on the season.
Danny Beddes lasted three innings and allowed four runs on four hits while striking out three, setting a new single-season strikeout record for the Wolverines and now has 99 on the season.
The Wolverines will face elimination on Saturday in a game scheduled for 2 p.m. CT against either No. 2 Rice or No. 3 Southeastern Louisiana. The two were scheduled to play game number two on Friday but the delay forced that game to Saturday morning at 9 a.m. CT. Rain could play a factor in Saturday's schedule as well.
