SATURDAY’S GAME: Texas 11, LSU 7

SUNDAY’S GAME: 2 p.m. / SECNetwork+

 

LSU lost a battle of the bullpens at Texas Saturday  night.

In a wild, back-and-forth game, the Longhorns took the lead for good in the seventh inning and put it away with three insurance runs in the bottom of the eighth for an 11-7 victory over the Tigers.

The loss broke LSU’s 17-game winning streak, the longest in the nation and the Tigers’ longest since the 2017 team also won 17 in a row.

LSU, ranked No. 2 in the nation, fell to 22-2, 4-1 in the SEC, while the No. 8 Longhorns are 18-3, 4-1.

With LSU winning the opener 8-2 Friday, the series will now come down to Sunday’s rubber game at 2 p.m. LSU will send  righthander Chase Shores (4-0, 3.80) to the mound. Texas has not announced a starting pitcher.

“Now we have to respond quickly,” LSU coach Jay Johnson said. “We have a short turnaround for Sunday’s game and we have to re-set and get ready to go.”

The Tigers presumably will still have some arms left — Johnson said some of the eight who pitched Saturday might be used in Sunday’s game.

Seven were summoned from the bullpen Saturday. And the relief corps combined to give up seven runs on nine hits in 3 2/3 innings.

Texas starter Luke Harrison lasted just four innings, but the Longhorns finished the game with just two relievers and Max Grubbs (2-0) and Dylan Volantis held LSU scoreless over the final three innings.

LSU, which did not walk a batter in Friday’s 8-2 victory, walked seven Saturday — four in the Longhorns’ game-changing 4-run fifth inning alone.

LSU Saturday starter Anthony Eyanson left with a 5-2 lead in the fifth after giving up a walk and a single with one out.

Three more walks followed and, after Texas scored one run on a wild pitch by Conner Ware, the Longhorns capped the inning with Ryan Galvan’s 3-run homer off of freshman William Schmidt  for a 6-5 UT lead.

“Galvan’s homer was the big one and we knew it,” Johnson said.

LSU regained the lead, 7-6, in the sixth on Derek Curiel’s 2-out, 2-run homer.

But Texas’ Jalin Flores led off the bottom of the seventh with a towering home run to left field off of Connor Benge. Benge (0-1) then gave up two singles before he was relieved by D.J. Primeaux, who gave up an RBI single to Will Gasparino that put Texas up 8-7.

The Longhorns got all the insurance they needed with three runs in the bottom of the eighth after rightfielder Josh Pearson misplayed a single for a two-base error that put a runner on third and forced LSU to play the infield in.

It led to three more runs on two ground ball singles that otherwise might have been handled.

“I told the team that we just won 17 games in a row,” Johnson said. “That’s really hard to do in baseball, so I told them I was proud of them. We can’t let the disappointment from the loss diminish that.”

LSU’s Jared Jones went 3-for-5, scoring twice and driving in a run with a double in the fifth.

The Tigers had nine hits, but were only 2-for-9 with runners in scoring position.