No. 8 St. Amant held on for a 5-4 win over No. 1 Barbe Saturday in Game 3 to win the best-of-three quarterfinal series and advance to next week’s state tournament in Sulphur.

The Gators (33-7) will play No. 4 Sulphur in the semifinal round. The Tors swept Zachary.

St. Amant jumped ahead early, scoring a pair of runs in the first inning on a solo home run by Lee Amedee and RBI double by Brayden Kuriger.

The lead grew to 5-0 in the third when Connor Molaison hit a three-run double to score Blaise Lalonde, Ashtyn Ellis and Landon Stewart.

Barbe (36-4) fought back, scoring three runs in the fourth inning. Owen Galt singled to score Blake Moss and Donovan LaSalle singled to score two runs with two outs.

The Bucs added another run in the sixth on a bases-loaded walk by Gavin Guidry. Barbe loaded the bases in the seventh but reliever Kuriger got the final out on a fly ball.

“They played great,” Barbe head Glenn Cecchini said of the Gators. “They had more than two pitchers and are a good, hard-working team with a lot of tradition.

“We fought hard. We have won 90 percent of our games the last four years, no one else in the state can say that.”

Galt had three hits and Lasalle added two for Barbe.

Barbe left 10 runners on base, including the bases loaded in the sixth and seventh innings.

Molaison and Amedee had two hits each for St. Amant.

Game 2

Barbe 5

St. Amant 0

Barbe forced the third game with a dominant performance from Guidry, who struck out 11 and allowed four hits over six innings.

Donnell Sandifer and Galt scored on wild pitches in the second inning. Grant Comeaux added a two-run double in the fifth, scoring Crawford Courville and Guidry.

Galt doubled and scored on a Courville sacrifice fly in the sixth inning.