HOOVER, Ala. — The Mississippi State baseball team was out of sync.
Whether it was Dakota Hudson on the mound or his teammates in the field or at the plate, the Bulldogs didn’t do much right Thursday against one of the nation’s hottest teams.
Hudson lasted five innings, the defense committed three errors, and the offense scuffled in top-seeded and No. 2 MSU’s 6-2 loss to fifth-seeded and No. 7 LSU in a winners’ bracket game in the Southeastern Conference tournament at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium.
“We weren’t locked in, and we didn’t pay attention the way we should have,” said MSU coach John Cohen, whose team had its 12-game winning streak snapped. “Credit to them. They just played a better baseball game.”
Top-seeded MSU (41-15-1) will play fourth-seeded and No. 4 Florida at approximately 6:30 p.m. today (SEC Network) in an elimination game. Florida eliminated Alabama 5-4 on Thursday.
LSU has won 14 of the last 15, including three-straight in the tournament. It will face the winner of the MSU-Florida game on Saturday in a winner-take-all semifinal. The winner of that game will play in the tournament’s title game Sunday.
Hudson entered with back-to-back complete game shutouts against Auburn and Arkansas. He breezed through the first inning with a strikeout, a groundout, and a pop out. He allowed a two-out single to Beau Jordan in the second, but he retired Greg Deichmann on a groundout.
The Tigers (42-17) took a 1-0 lead in the third when Jake Fraley drove home Cole Freeman with a single to right field. LSU added two more runs in the fourth thanks to an error by Hudson on a sacrifice bunt and a high throw by shortstop Ryan Gridley on what would have been the final out of the frame. The Tigers added another run in the fifth on a single by Deichmann.
Hudson (9-4) gave up four runs (two earned) on nine hits — all singles. He walked one and struck out six.
“He got underneath their bats, they hit ground balls, and we weren’t standing where they hit the ground balls,” Cohen said. “Some of them were hit hard, and some of them were not hit hard.”
In 11 1/3 innings, LSU has scored 11 runs on 21 hits off Hudson. The junior right-hander allowed seven runs on 12 hits in 6 1/3 innings in a 12-8 win on April 22 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
After the Bulldogs cut the lead to 4-2 with two runs in the top of the seventh, LSU extended the lead against reliever Vance Tatum relieved Hudson. With one out, an error by Jake Mangum in right field and a hit batter put runners on first and second. Daniel Brown relieved Tatum and struck out Jordan, but Michael Papierski scored two with a single to left field.
“Nobody works harder than Michael Papierski,” LSU coach Paul Mainieri said. “He’s always the first guy to the field and the last guy to leave. He’s in the batting cages. He’s got a lot of pride.”
LSU starter Jared Poche (7-4) kept MSU at bay for the first six innings. Reid Humphreys reached second on an error by right fielder Duplantis to begin the seventh. He scored on Jacob Robson’s triple into the left-center field gap. Mangum drove home Robson with a groundout.
The Bulldogs scored seven runs (six earned) on eight hits in six innings against Poche in the series opener in the regular season.
“I think he was sharper with his stuff. He had better command,” Robson said. “Last time he was more around the zone, and this time he was pretty much spotting up most of his outing. I think that’s what kept us a little off balanced.”
Reliever Parker Bugg struck out Gavin Collins with runners on the corners in the seventh to end the threat.
“Jared Poche was as good as he’s been all year,” Mainieri said. “You could tell even in the first inning that he was commanding his fastball and his breaking ball. He had life on his fastball. I thought Poche was outstanding, and, of course, Parker Bugg did a tremendous job. We played good defense with the exception of that pop fly that we dropped. I still thought we swung the bats. We had 12 hits today and faced one of the best pitchers in the league (Dakota Hudson). I thought Papierski had a great game, drove in three runs. It was just a solid game all-around, maybe one of our better games we’ve played all year.”
Although the Bulldogs likely have locked up a national seed for the NCAA tournament, they will try to get back in sync today.
“Our kids have been locked in for a long time for the most part, and hopefully this was a blip on the radar screen,” Cohen said.
Follow Dispatch sports writer Ben Wait on Twitter @bcwait
Ben Wait reports on Mississippi State University sports for The Dispatch.
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