BATON ROUGE, La. — The final salute to Josh Lovelady began early Monday morning.
The Mississippi State baseball team’s senior catcher turned to the dugout after a ninth-inning popout marked his final at-bat as a Bulldog. As the remaining MSU fans at Alex Box Stadium gave Lovelady a standing ovation, a line of Bulldogs greeted him when he returned to the dugout. Lovelady shared his most emphatic embrace with classmate Cody Brown.
The final game in the MSU careers of Lovelady and Brown proved to be an unceremonious send-off, a 14-4 loss to No. 4 LSU in Game 2 of the NCAA tournament’s Baton Rouge Super Regional.
Kramer Robertson led LSU (48-17) with three hits, while Antoine Duplantis had two. LSU won its 16th-straight game to advance to the College World Series. LSU will face Florida State (44-21) in its College World Series opener Saturday or Sunday at TD Ameritrade Park. The winner of that game will face No. 1 Oregon State or Cal State Fullerton. Game dates and times are expected to be announced today.
MSU (40-27) capped a season that featured 25 come-from-behind wins, 19 wins against Southeastern Conference opposition, and a Hattiesburg Regional championship.
Those statistics weren’t lost on Lovelady and Brown, a redshirt senior infielder/outfielder, who recognize the potential of the program they are leaving.
“For the most part with those younger guys, I was telling them, ‘Hey, this isn’t your last game. Learn from this, learn how we got here, learn what we did wrong to not go to Omaha and make a run at it again,’ ” Lovelady said.
No. 20 MSU rebounded from early trouble that saw starting pitcher Jacob Billingsley fail to record an out after allowing three hits, a walk, and two runs. Trey Jolly helped the Bulldogs get out of the inning without any more damage, but LSU, which rallied for four runs in the eighth inning in a 4-3 victory Saturday night, saved its hits for big rallies. The Tigers scored six runs in the fifth and five more in the ninth.
Cole Freeman, Greg Deichmann, Josh Smith, Michael Papierski, and Jake Slaughter also had hits for LSU. Papierski and Robertson scored three runs.
MSU chased LSU starting pitcher Jared Poche with four runs in the third. Poche walked Lovelady to start the frame. Harrison Bragg followed with a two-run home run just inside the foul pole down the left-field line.
After a lineout, Poche walks loaded the bases and was lifted for Caleb Gilbert. Jake Mangum and Elijah MacNamee followed with run-scoring singles to give MSU a 4-3 lead.
“We take a 4-3 lead into the fourth inning and, in reality, it probably couldn’t have worked out any better,” MSU coach Andy Cannizaro said. “We send our Saturday starter, Denver McQuary, to the mound. We did everything possible. You can see in the numbers of arms we threw, it was all hands on deck.”
But Gilbert (6-1) retired the next 15 in a row to give the Tigers a chance to rally. In the fifth, LSU had three hits and three walks, including a two-run double by Robertson, who was 3-for-5 with three runs and two RBIs.
After Jolly, MSU used Trysten Barlow before McQuary (3-4). Cole Gordon, Peyton Plumlee, Spencer Price, and Parker Ford followed. Gordon finished the fifth and retired 10 Tigers in a row at one point. The Tigers outhit the Bulldogs 10-5 and capitalized on seven walks.
“I expect them to win a national championship,” Cannizaro said. “I think they have the most dynamic lineup in the country. Everybody’s playing at a high level. They’ve got outstanding starting pitching and that bullpen’s phenomenal.”
Bragg led MSU with two hits. Brown, Mangum and MacNamee also had hits.
Cannizaro credited his team for its fight and never-give-up attitude. He said nobody expected much from the Bulldogs this season and that he was incredibly proud of a group that defied the odds and helped make his first season as a head coach a memorable one. Cannizaro made sure to single out the leadership of Lovelady and Brown that helped set the tone.
“Josh Lovelady, our catcher, we are talking about an absolute warrior,” Cannizaro said. “He basically caught every single game this year, every single inning. He led us to victories. He did everything in his power every single day to lead a young pitching staff, a staff that was short on numbers. He rallied those guys, led them, and I cannot speak highly enough about him. He and Cody Brown, two fifth-year seniors, have experienced every high and every low you can have in the SEC. They have won the SEC. They have been on teams that have not made the tournament before.
“Cody Brown had an outstanding senior year. He hit over .320 with nine home runs, double-digit stolen bases, played multiple positions. These guys led our team this year, and I want to thank them and our seniors for everything they did for our program. I will forever be grateful for every single thing they did this year. Our program is going to continue to get better and better and better.”
NOTE: Lightning forced the game to be delayed 31 minutes prior to its scheduled 8:04 p.m. start. It also was delayed for 31 minutes in the sixth and for 28 minutes with four outs remaining.
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brett Hudson on Twitter @Brett_Hudson
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