OMAHA, Neb. — A late night turned into a long day for the UCLA baseball team at the College World Series.
The 15th-seeded Bruins lost to sixth-seeded LSU, 9-5, on Tuesday morning in the resumption of a winner’s bracket game that was postponed after a lengthy weather delay on Monday night.
The first loss of the postseason puts UCLA into a 4 p.m. PDT elimination game against third-seeded Arkansas back at Charles Schwab Field Omaha later in the day Tuesday (ESPN).
Leading 5-3 after three complete innings Monday night, the Tigers jumped on UCLA reliever Wylan Moss in their first cracks Tuesday, tallying a pair of runs with two outs in the fourth.
Derek Curiel singled to left and Ethan Frey walked before back-to-back RBI singles from Steven Milam and Jake Brown extended the lead.
A Daniel Dickinson blooper to right drove in another for the Tigers in the seventh.
They got 4⅓ innings of steady pitching from freshman Casan Evans. The right-hander out of Houston struck out five and scatted four hits to earn his fifth win of the season.
Evans, who had three starts this season, threw 68 pitches just three days after closing out Saturday’s 4-1 opening-round win over Arkansas with a scoreless ninth inning for his team-leading seventh save of the year.
UCLA eventually chased Evans with two on in the eighth via a Mulivai Levu one-out single and a Roman Martin hit by pitch. Freshman lefty Cooper Williams replaced Evans and added to the troubles with a walk of AJ Salgado.
Two groundballs to second – first an RBI groundout by Payton Brennan, then a Blake Balsz infield hit – produced a pair of runs. After Cashel Dugger walked to again load the bases – with the sophomore representing the tying run – LSU went back its pen in the form of 6-foot-8, 252-pound sophomore Chase Shores.
The big right-hander needed just one pitch to get his team out of the jam, getting No. 9 hitter Phoenix Call on a groundout to short.
Jared Jones, who had a three-run home run in the opening inning Monday night, tacked on an insurance run with a two-out single to center against UCLA closer Easton Hawk in the bottom of the eighth.
LSU was 7 for 15 in the game with two outs.
Shores had a clean ninth with three groundouts for the save, pushing LSU into Wednesday night’s Bracket 2 final and one win away from the weekend’s best-of-three championship series.
UCLA, meanwhile, now must come back later in the day Tuesday. The Bruins tied a tournament record for pitchers in a game with eight, that after using six in Saturday’s opening-round victory over Murray State.
