GROS HANDCUFFS TIGERS AGAIN?June 1, 2002

6/1/2002 12:00:00 AM | Baseball

GROS HANDCUFFS TIGERS AGAIN

June 1, 2002

?BATON ROUGE – Same story, different verse.

?Louisiana-Lafayette junior left-hander Andy Gros continued his dominance of nationally ranked LSU, and the Cajuns got two solo home runs off the Tigers' Lane Mestepey en route to a dominating 5-0 NCAA Regional win Saturday afternoon at Alex Box Stadium.

?Gros (11-4) hurled his second shutout of the season against the Tigers (41-20) – holding LSU to just seven hits – to send UL Lafayette (39-21) into Sunday's regional championship game against the winner of Saturday's late LSU-Tulane matchup.

?The All-Sun Belt pitcher, who shut out the Tigers at "Tigue" Moore Field March 19, has now held the Tigers to 14 hits and no runs in 18 innings of work this season.

?Offensively, Gros was helped by Justin Bourque and Bryan Sneed, who each hit line-drive home runs off Mestepey (11-4). The Cajuns also got two hits and two RBIs from Corey Coles.

?Gros did all the rest. Throwing 111 pitches, the 2000 Freshman All-American stranded eight LSU base runners, including three in scoring position in the middle innings.

?The two shutouts against LSU are the only ones of Gros' career.

?Bouruqe's home run, meanwhile, got the scoring going in the fourth. Prior to the blast, Mestepey was cruising. The left-hander sat down the first 10 Cajuns.

?Sneed followed with his ninth round-tripper of the season in the seventh. UL Lafayette broke it open by scoring in each of the final three frames.

?The Cajuns are now one win away from advancing to their third NCAA Super Regoinal in four years. The LSU-Tulane winner will have to beat the Cajuns twice in order to advance.

--LOUISIANA-LAFAYETTE--