By GLENN GUILBEAU, Tiger Rag Editor
LSU opened its NCAA Super Regional softball tournament at No. 1 seed Alabama on fire with a lead-off double by Jalia Lassiter Friday night in Tuscaloosa.
And that’s about all the Tigers did in a 7-0 loss to the Crimson Tide on 10 hits in front of 3,000 mostly red-clad fans at Rhoads Stadium that basically swallowed any Purple & Gold.
LSU (40-18) now faces elimination against Alabama (53-7) at 2 p.m. Saturday on ESPN. An LSU win will force a third game on Sunday at an undetermined time as the Tigers try to reach their first World Series since 2017.
The Tigers didn’t look like themselves at all after coming in off a sweep of their NCAA Regional and after eight wins in nine games. They also wore strange, non-school colored turquoise tops, and LSU was shut out for the first time since a 1-0 loss at Missouri on April 4.
“This team is tough,” LSU coach Beth Torina said leading up to the game of her Tigers, who started off 0-5 in the Southeastern Conference before finishing 13-11. “The things they went through made them tougher. They understand they can take a punch.”
And they did that Friday.
Lassiter struggled to find anything to say when she was to lead off the postgame press conference, so Torina gave her a break and took over.
“Can’t think of any things we did well,” she said. “Didn’t think we executed. They executed everything they wanted. We let the moment get big for us, it felt. We let it get away from us early and just couldn’t get back in it. Tough to do against a pitcher like that.”
After Lassiter’s hit, Alabama ace starter Jocelyn Briski, the SEC pitcher of the year who went to 23-3 with the win, proceeded to no-hit the Tigers the rest of the way with 11 strikeouts and zero walks for the complete game victory over seven innings. She threw 66 strikes out of 94 pitches and retired 21 straight to finish.
After the Lassiter double, Briski got Sierra Daniel to fly out to left before Kylee Edwards grounded out to third. Then she struck out Alix Franklin.
“She’s one of the best in the nation,” Lassiter said later. “She’s always gotten better each year. At the end of the day, she gave us pitches to hit, and we just didn’t go for it. They’re a great team. We are, too. We didn’t show you what we have tonight, but we’ll come back tomorrow (Saturday) and will.”
Alabama scored the only run it needed in the bottom of the first when Jena Young singled off LSU starter Paytn Monticelli, reached third on Alexis Pupillo’s double and scored on a passed ball by LSU catcher Maci Bergeron. Audrey Vandagriff’s RBI single made it 2-0 in the first.
The Tide went up 3-0 in the third on a Pupillo home run to right field off Monticelli. Young’s three-run double that greeted LSU reliever Cece Cellura put Alabama up 6-0 in the fourth. A throwing error by Bergeron pushed across an unearned run in the fifth for the touchdown lead.
Monticelli (9-4) took the loss after giving up six earned runs on seven hits and a walk with one strikeout in three and a third innings. Cellura gave up the unearned run and allowed three hits with a walk and two strikeouts in two and two-thirds innings of relief.
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