LSU baseball is back in the Box this weekend for its first three game series against the same team with Rhode Island’s Bryant College making the trip to Baton Rouge.
The Bulldogs (2-1) took two out of three from Abilene Christian in their opening weekend matchup and hit .308 as a team with an on base percentage of .392. Coach Paul Mainieri said the scary thing about playing teams like Bryant is that even the most devoted college baseball fans probably haven’t even heard of them.
Bryant is making its second trip to Alex Box in a decade as the Bulldogs were previous visit came in a regional back in 2012 but didn’t play LSU (4-0), rather losing to Houston and Southeastern both in 10 innings.
“There are teams in college baseball that a lot of really good fans have never heard of,” Mainieri said. “Yet they’re really a talented team and I think they can be put in that, dare I say, Stony Brook category.”
Bryant returns eight of its nine starters from a season ago including sophomore outfielder Ryan Ward who was the Northeast Conference player of the year as a freshman as well as Sunday starter Steve Theetge who has 24 career wins under his belt.
First pitch on Friday is set for 7 p.m. followed by a 3 p.m. game on Saturday after the LSU-Tennessee basketball game, and concludes with a 2 p.m. game on Sunday afternoon.
“I told our players to forget about what their name is across their chest,” Mainieri said. “Take your jerseys off and write Texas A&M or Tennessee because this is a very physical hitting team that is trying to hit doubles and homeruns.”
One pitcher that’s trying to pick himself up and keep Bryant from hitting those doubles and homeruns is ace Zack Hess, who allowed six hits and four earned runs in barely three innings of play. It was back to the drawing board for the junior pitcher, who watched film and made a few mechanical adjustments based off what he and pitching coach Alan Dunn saw.
“Mostly my leg kick was a little lower on Friday then it had been during the summer,” Hess said. “Naturally your leg is going to land a little too soon and your arm is going to lag behind as well. So when I’m elevating my leg more, it allows my arm to catch up and get things back in sync.”
The pitching staff suffered a few setbacks in the injury department as Mainieri announced that the only left handed pitcher on the roster, freshman Easton McMurray underwent season ending surgery to his shoulder.
In addition to McMurray, Mainieri said that freshman pitcher Chase Costello felt soreness after his most recent performance this weekend and will be held out of the lineup this weekend, though the team doesn’t think it’s anything serious. Sophomore Ma’Khail Hilliard will continue to be out as the team figures out an answer to his continued soreness.
Hilliard had a small procedure done earlier in the week and was expected to start throwing again on Thursday and LSU will see how he feels.
One player that dodged a major bullet on Tuesday was shortstop Josh Smith, who took a fastball to the mouth while at bat late against Southeastern. Smith said the area was numb for the rest of the game but has since said it feels better, with only a few cuts to show for it.
“That didn’t feel very good but more than anything it just scared me,” Smith said. “I thought I was going to take my hand off my chin and there was going to be blood everywhere but there wasn’t but it wasn’t too bad after the initial shock.”
Smith had a seven hit streak snapped against Southeastern, three hits shy of an LSU record set by Mason Katz in 2012.
“I was doing everything at the plate that I had been working on and it worked out,” Smith said. “I got lucky on a few balls that fell in the gaps but I guess that’s baseball. If I had gone 0-for-10 on the week it still would’ve been great just to be back out there and healthy.”
