Baseball: Pitching and Three-Run Sixth Inning Pushes Louisiana Baseball Past McNeese State

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LAFAYETTE – Louisiana’s pitching and three-run sixth inning pushed the Ragin’ Cajuns past McNeese State, 4-3, at M.L. ‘Tigue’ Moore Field at Russo Park on Wednesday night.

Josh Cofield was a beast at the plate, recording his first home run as a Ragin’ Cajun, a 400-foot shot to right-center field. Cofield also came up with a key two-out RBI-base knock to record two of Louisiana’s RBI on the night.

Drake Osborn also collected two hits in the game, and drove home CJ Willis on an RBI-double that proved to be the game winner. Osborn collected his sixth multi-hit game of the season and has seen his batting average increase to a season-best .289 over the last few games.

Willis was sharp at the plate, coming off the bench and roping an RBI-triple to centerfield that tied the game in the sixth.

The men on the bump were terrific as the bullpen posted four innings of three-hit baseball and fanning seven Cowboys on zero walks.

Austin Perrin was sharp in his fifth start of the season, tossing 5.0 innings with five strikeouts. Perrin has now tossed in 10.0 innings against McNeese State, allowed zero earned runs and struck out 12 Cowboys this year. 

Some of the fielding from South Alabama carried early into tonight’s game as the Ragin’ Cajuns (21-15, 7-5 SBC) committed two key errors in the third inning, which eventually brought home three runs for McNeese State.

Cofield gave Louisiana a run back in the bottom of the fourth, blasting his first home run of the season, putting the game at 3-1 in favor of McNeese State (18-19, 12-11 SLC).

Following a scoreless fifth from Jack Burk (3-0), tonight’s winning pitcher, and scoreless sixth from Blake Marshall and Carter Robinson, Louisiana was able to muster three-two out hits to take a 4-3 lead.

Cofield, Osborn and Willis all recorded the two-out RBI hits in the sixth inning. All four runs in tonight’s game were charged to Wednesday night’s losing pitcher, Ty Abraham (2-1).

The bullpen went into shutdown mode on Wednesday night, specifically seeing Jacob Schultz touch 96 on the radar gun and record three-straight punch outs to earn his third save of the season and the 4-3 win for Louisiana.

The Ragin’ Cajuns have a big test this weekend as they travel to Little Rock for a Sun Belt West showdown with the Trojans. Due to expected weather in the area, Friday’s game against Little Rock has been pushed up to 2 p.m.