HOOVER, Ala. — Junior catcher Henri Lartigue went 4-for-5 with a career-high four RBIs and three runs scored Wednesday to lead the seventh-seeded and No. 10 Ole Miss baseball team to a 10-4 victory against second-seeded and No. 9 South Carolina in the second round of the Southeastern Conference tournament at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium.
Ole Miss (42-16) will face sixth-seeded and No. 12 Vanderbilt (43-15) at 4:30 p.m. today (SEC Network) in a winners’ bracket game of the double-elimination portion of the annual event.
The Rebels’ No. 3-7 hitters in the lineup went 12-for-21 (.571) with nine runs scored and seven RBIs.
“Some of our guys weren’t swinging it well (in the regular season) and are swinging it well now,” Ole Miss coach Mike Bianco said. “Collectively as an offense we’re much better than we were a couple of months ago.”
Lartigue also belted a three-run home run in the eighth inning to double Ole Miss’ lead and put the game out of reach. J.B. Woodman reached base all five times and scored four times to tie his personal best. Colby Bortles, Tate Blackman, and Ryan Olenek also had multi-hit games. Bortles smacked his team-leading 19th double of the season that plated two runs.
“We’re not a team that’s going to get 15 hits a game,” Lartigue said. “We’re all about the timely hit. That’s what we’ve been able to do well.”
Ole Miss is 27-0 when scoring at least seven runs this season.
After an impressive relief outing earlier in the season against the Gamecocks (42-14) in which he allowed one run in 4 1/3 innings sophomore David Parkinson (5-3) allowed two runs on five hits, tying a career-high in strikeouts with six.
Pitching for the second-straight day, sophomore Will Stokes threw three scoreless innings to collect his seventh save.
Gene Cone went 3-for-5 to pace South Carolina.
Clarke Schmidt (9-3) surrendered seven runs (four earned) and seven hits. The Gamecocks committed five errors that led to four runs.
n LSU 5, Florida 3, 14 innings: Jordan Romero knocked home the go-ahead run with a pinch-hit single in the 14th inning to help the Tigers beat the Gators in a marathon that ended early this morning.
The game lasted five hours, seven minutes, making it the longest game in SEC tournament history in terms of time. It was only the fourth time an SEC Tournament game has reached 14 innings.
LSU (41-17) will play Mississippi State (41-14-1), which beat Alabama 4-1 on Wednesday. Florida (44-12) will face Alabama (32-25) in an elimination game.
Romero’s single to right scored Chris Reid to give LSU a 4-3 lead. Cole Freeman followed with a bloop hit that brought home Brennan Breaux.
Florida loaded the bases with nobody out in the bottom of the 11th, but Jesse Stallings (3-0) got out of the jam when Nelson Maldonado popped up and Deacon Liput lined into an unassisted double play.
Before the extra-inning heroics, Florida left-hander A.J. Puk and LSU right-hander Alex Lange dueled for seven innings. Lange allowed five of the first six batters to reach base, but he settled in as only three more reached base while he was in the game. He struck out 11 and allowed two runs on five hits. Puk struck out seven and gave up two runs on six hits.
Florida took a 2-0 lead in the first thanks to a RBI double by JJ Schwarz and an RBI triple by and Buddy Reed.
Both teams were scoreless in the next six innings.
LSU broke up Puk’s shutout in the eighth when Antoine Duplantis scored on a throwing error. Florida’s Shaun Anderson entered from the bullpen with one runner on base. Jake Fraley then scored on a fielder’s choice by Kramer Robertson. The Tigers took their first lead of the game on a single by Bryce Jordan.
The tournament’s reigning champions then rallied. With one out in the bottom of the ninth, Florida tied the game on a Deacon Liput RBI single. LSU catcher Michael Papierski threw out Liput at second to send the game to extra innings.
n Vanderbilt 6, Texas A&M 5: Pinch hitter Walker Grisanti’s solo home run in the top of the ninth lifted the sixth-seeded and No. 12 Commodores past the second-seeded and No. 1 Aggies in a game where nine runs were scored with two outs.
Grisanti’s home run snapped Mark Ecker’s 31 1/3-inning scoreless streak. It also dropped No. 1 Texas A&M (41-14) to 34-1 when leading after seven innings.
It was the second-consecutive game in which a Commodore pinch hitter homered.
Vanderbilt coach Tim Corbin was confident in calling Grisanti to bat, but he wasn’t sure how much success the freshman would have against Ecker.
“A home run is one thing,” said Corbin, whose team improved to 43-15. “Ecker has been untouched most of the year, so it’s very difficult to navigate. Credit him. It was a big, big hit.”
The 11 runs scored matched the total for the three-game series when the teams met earlier this month.
The Aggies struck first in the bottom of the second. Facing a two-out situation with Ryne Birk on first and Nick Banks on second, Jonathan Moroney’s two-run double to left-center field made it 2-0. Austin Homan’s triple made it 3-0.
Vanderbilt responded in the top of the third when Will Toffey, who was 3-for-5 in the regular season with the bases loaded, had a two-run single with two outs to make it 3-2. Kaiser followed with a single to tie the game.
The Commodores took the lead in the fourth on a Julian Infante solo home run, his second home run of the tournament.
Texas A&M scored two runs in the sixth to re-take the lead. Banks’ double tied the game. He scored on a single by Homan that made it 5-4.
Vanderbilt reliever Matt Ruppenthal (5-1) held the Aggies hitless in the final three innings.
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