LSU baseball’s magical run continued on Saturday night when the Tigers won Game 1 of the men’s College World Series final 4–3 in 11 innings over Florida.
With the game tied in top of the 11th inning, LSU DH Cade Beloso blasted a home run well over the right field wall. The Tigers would hold on for the thrilling extra-inning victory.
“The previous at-bat, he struck me out on three straight heaters and I figured he would go back to it,” Beloso said, per Eric Olson of the Associated Press. “They weren’t going to switch anything up. I got one I was supposed to swing at and put a good swing on it,” Olson added.
But the story of the night was the performance of starting pitcher Ty Floyd. The hard-throwing righthander recorded 17 strikeouts, while allowing three earned runs while scattering just five hits and walking only one over eight innings.
The impressive feat set a new SEC and LSU record for strikeouts in a men’s College World Series game, while tying Arizona State’s Ed Bane in 1972 for the most strikeouts in a 9-inning game in MCWS history, per ESPN.
“Really hard to put into words what that performance meant for the outcome of the game and for our team,” Floyd said, per The Advocate’s Leah Vann.
LSU’s dream run will continue Sunday, as the Gators look to send the series to a third game.
