SATURDAY’S GAME: LSU 17, Miss. State 8

Late Saturday night LSU led by five runs before Mississippi State recorded an out and eventually sent 12 men to the plate while scoring eight runs in the first inning.

The Tigers then spent the rest of the game searching for strikes out of its bullpen.

It took just over four hours and didn’t end until 1:42 a.m. — the start of the game was delayed three and half hours by rainy weather — before the Tigers beat Mississippi State 17-9 early Sunday morning.

“Weird night,” LSU coach Jay Johnson said after a second straight game ended well after midnight. “Weird couple of nights. But very pleased overall.”

It completed a three-game sweep of the Southeastern Conference series for the Tigers (26-3, 7-2 SEC) while Mississippi State fell to 16-12, 1-8.

“Any sweep is good, but a conference sweep against a team that has plenty of talent, like Mississippi State, that will win plenty of games going forward, it’s a big deal.”

Jared Jones’ 2-run, 440-foot  homer to dead centerfield got the first inning rolling and, after his second hit of the inning, Jones  ended it when he feigned an attempted steal of second that allowed Derek Curiel to slip in and score from third.

Ethan Frey also had a 2-run single in the big inning as the Tigers got eight of their eventual 19 hits in the opening inning.

“That first inning is one of the best offensive innings I’ve maybe ever seen in my entire career,” Johnson said.

Starting pitcher Chase Shores was forced out of the game after four innings, but not because he gave up solo home run and a 3-run double in the only one more batter in finishing the inning after a batted ball deflected off his glove to above his eye.

“He’s OK,” Johnson said. “He got cut on the face basically on a come-backer. He was little bit ‘off’ when he came back to the dugout.”

So Shores did not come back out for the fifth.

Just about everybody in the LSU bullpen, however, did get in.

The Tigers, who used their two most reliable relievers to save victories in the first two games of the series, eventually used six in relief of Shores.

The LSU pitchers combined to walk seven and hit four others while seemingly spending the whole game behind in the count.

But every time Mississippi State threatened to make a game of it, the Tigers responded.

Jones was 3-for-4 with three RBIs and three runs scored. Daniel Dickinson was 3-for-5 with three RBIs and a pair of runs scored. Chris Stanfield was 3-for-5 with three runs scored.

Luis Hernandez also had three hits and hit his second home run in as many games with a 2-run shot.

Jake Brown scored twice and also had an RBI single.