University of Louisiana at Lafayette Athletics
Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns
Arkansas State
Miscues Cost Cajuns in ASU Series Finale
3/14/2010 8:45:00 PM | Baseball
A series of events on one at bat caused the game to get away from Louisiana Sunday afternoon at M.L. "Tigue" Moore Field and Arkansas State went on to claim a 13-9 victory in the finale of the Sun Belt opening weekend series.
The win gave the series victory to ASU (10-5, 2-1 Sun Belt). Louisiana (9-6, 1-2 Sun Belt) falls to 4-4 on its current 10-game homestand.
The Cajuns will wrap up their homestand with midweek games against Southern and Southeastern Louisiana on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively. Wednesday's game is Season Ticket Redemption Night.
With a 6-5 lead and Jordan Castaldo and Jordan Kimball on the basepath with two outs in the seventh, ASU's Michael Faulkner punched a single into shallow left field. That scored Castaldo (leadoff single) from second base.
The Cajuns defense - which committed a season-high, seven errors - committed two costly errors after the single that helped ASU pull away.
Joey Satriano picked up the ball that got away from Chad Keefer on the throw from Alex Fuselier on the single. His attempt to throw out Kimball at third base was wide of the bag and rolled into left field allowing Kimball to score the second run. Fuselier booted the ball in left field allowing Faulkner to score and give ASU a 9-5 lead.
The Red Wolves tacked on a pair of runs in the eighth and ninth and those proved valuable as Fuselier belted a grand slam for Louisiana in the bottom of the ninth.
Fuselier extended his team-high and career-best hitting streak to 12 games by going 2-of-3 with a game-high five RBI. He finished the series 6-of-11 (.545) with one triple, two home runs, eight RBI and a 1.273 slugging percentage.
Keefer was 1-of-4 with three runs scored as he stretched his hitting streak to seven games, which is one off his career-best.
Louisiana's next Sun Belt series takes places Friday-Sunday, March 19-21 in Mobile against South Alabama.
ASU jumped out to a 2-0 lead following their first two at bats.
A RBI triple down the right field line by Fuselier put UL on the scoreboard in the second. The triple scored Keefer who led off with a single. A Jacob Lee wild pitch allowed Fuselier to score and even the score at 2-all.
A Cody Pace RBI double put ASU in front 3-2 in the third inning. The Red Wolves tacked on three more runs and chased UL starting pitcher T.J. Geith from the contest.
Satriano entered in relief and recorded the final out and then proceeded to retire nine of the next 11 Red Wolves hitters he faced until the mishaps in the seventh did him in.
The Cajuns scored in the fourth, benefiting from a Lee wild pitch. In the fifth, Brian Bowman tripled home Greg Fontenot and scored on a passed ball to trim the deficit to 6-5.
-- Ragin' Cajuns --
