LSU baseball season over, Stony Brook advances to CWS
by LSU Sports.net
Jun 11, 2012 | 2440 views | 0 0 comments | 6 6 recommendations | email to a friend | print
LSU’s Mason Katz gets pumped up after he hits a home run in the Tigers’ loss to Stony Brook on Sunday evening.
LSU’s Mason Katz gets pumped up after he hits a home run in the Tigers’ loss to Stony Brook on Sunday evening.
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BATON ROUGE, La. -- Stony Brook (52-13) tossed its second-consecutive three-hitter on Sunday, as the Seawolves came back from a game down to advance past LSU to its first College World Series, 7-2, on Sunday night at Alex Box Stadium.

LSU (47-18), the Southeastern Conference Champion, won a 12-inning affair in game 1 that was halted by rain after 11 innings on Friday afternoon and resumed on Saturday morning with a 5-4 Tigers victory.

However, back-to-back complete games by Stony Brook pitching ended the Tigers' season.

"We had every confidence, every anticipation of going to Omaha and playing for the National Championship and all of a sudden it is over," said LSU coach Paul Mainieri. "The suddenness is just awful. I am sure that in time we will look back at this season, dwell on the positives, an SEC Championship, an SEC West Championship, and we won 47 ball games. I think in a lot of ways we overachieved.

"It will be the coaches' job to figure out a way for us to get better and be able to take the next step. We will do that, but we will do that in time. Right now I just hurt for these kids, especially the seniors and the kids that will not be back. They have given so much to our program, the university, and we are going to miss them dearly. I wish we could have sent them out with one more trip to Omaha."

After Sunday's game was moved from noon to 7 p.m. in anticipation of rain, Stony Brook starter Frankie Vanderka (3-3) allowed only two runs on three hits with four walks and five strikeouts.

Though the Tigers hit the ball well throughout the game, just about all of the contact landed in the Seawolves' gloves.

Meanwhile, Stony Brook leadoff hitter Travis Jankowski was 4-for-6 with two runs and No. 3 hitter Michael Carmona was 3-for-5 with two runs and one RBI.

Jankowski singled in front of LSU leftfielder Raph Rhymes to open the game and came around to score on a one-out single by Carmona to give the Seawolves a 1-0 lead.

The Tigers matched the run with a two-out solo home run to left field by Mason Katz that tied the game at 1-1 in the bottom of the first. However, that was the only hit LSU could muster off Vanderka until the seventh inning.

In the top of the third, Stony Brook put together three runs on five hits to drive starter Ryan Eades (5-3) from the game. Maxx Tessenbaum's RBI double scored Jankowski, who led off the inning with a double of his own. RBI singles by Kevin Krause and Steven Goldstein to end Eades' day with the Tigers trailing 4-1.

In the fourth, Stony Brook added two runs when LSU reliever Joe Broussard hit a batter and walked one to setup Tissenbaum's two-RBI double to left-center field.

The Seawolves' 6-1 lead would last until the bottom of the seventh when Alex Edward doubled to right-center, moved to third on a single by Tyler Hanover and scored on a sacrifice fly to deep right-center by Austin Nola.

Stony Brook answered the run with an RBI single by Krause that scored Carmona for a 7-2 lead.

Attendance for the game was a school record for a home baseball game, 10,620.
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