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The pitching duo of Dominic Taccolini and Zach Jackson were a sight for sore eyes after that SEMO let down yesterday.
Both guys gave the best performance the Hogs could ask from them. Taccolini went 6 innings and only gave up one run. His only mistake of the night was 400+ foot home run he gave up to Alex Bregman. But, there was a Hog fan living the dream out in Hog pen that tried to catch the home run ball with his visor. The video is as fantastic as it sounds.
But I digress back to the game, Jackson came in and dominated LSU hitters. He gave up one hit in three innings of relief to get the save.
The Hog bats got to Jared Poche early and often. It started in the bottom of the first with a little small ball. Clark Eagan and Joe Serrano lead off the game with back to back singles. Tyler Spoon laid down a sacrifice bunt to move the runners up and Luke Bonfield grounded out, but scored Eagan to give the Hogs the lead they would never relinquish.
Michael Bernal added another run with an RBI single scoring Andrew Benintendi to give the Hogs a 2-0 lead after two complete.
The Hogs broke the back of the Tigers in the 4th with a three run bottom half of the inning. Rick Nomura and Benintendi both had RBI singles. That was the five the Hogs needed and the lead was never in doubt after that.
Eagan was 3-5 at the plate with two runs scored. Benintendi was 2-3 with a run and a RBI. Those were the two big offensive producers for the Hogs.
It was a thing of beauty to see the Hogs have dominant pitching again. It was a giant question mark who will start Saturday, but Dave Van Horn said they will go with James Teague tomorrow..
Poche came in with a 5-0 record and a 2.32 ERA and the Razorbacks handed him his first loss of the season. He gave up a career amount of earned runs (5) and hits (10) to the Hogs.
The Hogs avoided their worst SEC start in school history by winning. The three previous times the Hogs started 0-3, they won the next series. They have tomorrow and Saturday to try to replicate that history. It's an 8:03 scheduled first pitch tomorrow night and will be carried by the SEC Network again.