University of Louisiana at Lafayette Athletics
Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns
Middle Tennessee
Cajuns Fall 6-4 In SBC Tournament Opener Against Middle Tennessee
5/21/2003 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Wednesday, May 21, 2003
Updated SBC Tournament Bracket & Results
LAFAYETTE - Louisiana's Ragin' Cajuns baseball team falls 6-4 to the Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders here at M.L. “Tigue” Moore Field in a first round Sun Belt Tournament match-up. UL Lafayette (28-29) must now face New Mexico State (42-14) in a 9:30 a.m. elimination game between the second and third seeds. Middle Tennessee moves on to the winner's bracket and will play Arkansas-Little Rock in the 6:30 p.m. nightcap.
Middle Tennessee starter Steve Kline tossed a career high eight innings and held the Cajun bats to just four runs on nine hits. Cajun reliever Kraig Schambough came in the game with the Cajuns trailing 3-2 in the third inning and held the Blue Raiders to just seven hits and two runs (one earned) for the remaining seven innings with a career high ten strikeouts, despite the Cajun loss.
Middle Tennessee jumped on Ragin' Cajun starter Jordy Templet with two early first inning runs off of three hits. MT shortstop Jeff Beachum led off the game with a single and scored on a Chad Cooper base hit to left field. Cooper came around to score the second run of the inning on a double to right center field by first baseman Jeff Archer.
Louisiana-Lafayette bounced right back with two runs of their own to even the game at 2-2 on a two-run blast over the right field wall by junior outfielder Corey Coles. It was the ninth homerun of the season for the Cajun's leading hitter.
The Blue Raiders continued the assault against Templet with consecutive singles by Nate Jaggers and Chris LegGuenec in the second inning. Jaggers scored with one out in the inning on a RBI ground out by Beachum to give the Blue Raiders a lead that they would not relinquish.
Templet left the game after just two innings following a lead off triple by MT outfielder Chad Cooper to open the third inning. MT greeted Cajun pitcher Kraig Schambough with a run scoring single by Josh Archer to go ahead 4-2.
The Ragin' Cajuns cut the MT lead to just one run in the bottom half of the third inning after shortstop Ray Dees led off the inning with a double and later scored on a one-out infield single by Corey Coles.
Middle Tennessee added one run against Schambough with a solo-shot over the left field wall by Chad Cooper in the fifth inning that put the Blue Raiders ahead 5-3
Ragin' Cajuns right fielder Kevin Preau cut the deficit back to just one run with a two out double in the sixth ining that scored Brad Saloom. Preau snapped a streak of five games without a hit with a single earlier in the fourth inning.
The Blue Raiders added another run in the top half of the ninth inning to take a two run lead and MT starter Steve Kline held the Cajun bats scoreless in the seventh and eighth innings before closer Chase Swing came on for the save in the ninth inning following a lead off throwing error by Kline that brought the tying run to the plate with no outs. Swing closed the door on any ninth inning magic by striking out the next three Cajun batters to record his ninth save of the season and send the Cajuns just one loss away from elimination.
Templet (6-5) suffered the loss for UL Lafayette after giving up four runs on six hits in just two innings pitched for his second shortest start of the season, while Kline (7-3) picked up the win for Middle Tennessee.
Ragin' Cajuns leading hitter Corey Coles drove in three of the four UL Lafayette runs by going 2 for 3 on the night. Blue Raider outfielder Chad Cooper went 3 for 4 with three runs scored and two runs batted in to lead his team.
UL Lafayette (28-29, 15-9 Sun Belt) will have an early wake-up call as they face New Mexico State in a 9:30 a.m. match-up that will send one team out of the tournament. The Cajuns will send senior left-hander Andy Gros (7-6, 3.88 ERA) to the mound against a team that hit a conference best .336 on the season.
South Alabama is the only Sun Belt team to ever win the conference tournament after losing in the first round. The Ragin' Cajuns witnessed the Jaguars win five straight and capture the tournament title here at Moore Field in 2001 following a 5-4 opening round loss to Arkansas-Little Rock.
-Ragin' Cajuns-
