Much of what Paul Mainieri tried seemed to backfire.
OMAHA, Neb. — Seventy-one games and six innings into a season that began in the third weekend in February, there stood LSU coach Paul Mainieri in the first-base side dugout, still with another decision to make.
He had Michael Papierski at the plate with runners on the corners and nobody out in a one-run game on a crisp June evening at the College World Series.
LSU needed a win to keep alive its season, otherwise Florida would leave as national champions. Much of what unfolded after that led to the Gators coming away with a 6-1 victory that completed a best-of-three series sweep at TD Ameritrade Park.
That ended the Tigers season. One that included SEC West and conference regular season championships, an SEC Tournament title and regional and super regional victories to get to Omaha.
Once here, LSU won its four-team bracket — winning three consecutive elimination games, the last two against a top-ranked Oregon State team that entered the tournament with four losses on the season.
Decisions and execution put LSU here.
Then came Tuesday.
“The whole game was kind of bizarre, ” Mainieri said.
Much of what Mainieri tried seemed to backfire.
Mainieri subbed in Nick Coomes as the starting first baseman ahead of Jake Slaughter only to switch them back after Coomes’ two errors in the first two innings led to a pair of unearned runs off senior left-hander Jared Poche, whose school-record career win total stayed at 39 with the loss.
Those two unearned runs loomed for much of the night as Florida spot starter Tyler Dyson limited the Tigers offensively by throwing more breaking pitches than anticipated.
“He threw it for a strike a lot more than he had in the past, ” LSU senior Kramer Robertson said in the aftermath of his final game at the school.
Not until the fifth inning did LSU put a runner in scoring position with less than two outs. That inning ended with Slaughter stranded on third.
LSU had the makings of a rally in the seventh after Florida brought in usual closer Michael Byrne to start the inning. Zach Watson reached on an infield single and Josh Smith drove him in with a double.
Slaughter came up next, and after two failed bunt attempts, he drilled a two-strike pitch into left that put runners on the corners with nobody out for Papierski.
Mainieri could have called for a squeeze bunt — it’s something he said after the game he commonly does in that situation — but he didn’t there.
“I just felt like Pap was swinging the bat really well and he was going to get the job done, ” Mainieri said.
What happened instead was a sequence of events that put two outs on the board and kept Smith standing at third.
An interference call on Jake Slaughter’s slide into the second base at the start of what would have been a 4-6-3 double play that scored Smith from third meant Smith could not advance on the play and Slaughter and Smith both were called out.
“I tried to go hard into second and did what I thought I was supposed to do and the (umpire) said I went out of my way to get him, ” Slaughter said. “That was his judgment, and that’s how it happened.”
Mainieri said LSU coaches talk with players all the time about the slide rule.
“Slide directly into the base, ” he said. “Their buttocks and legs have to hit the ground first. You can slide through the bag as long as it’s in a straight line to second base. The umpire said he didn’t do that.”
Mainieri said he had not yet looked at video of the play.
“My baserunner told me he did slide directly into the base, ” Mainieri said. “The umpire told me he didn’t. So somebody’s not telling the truth to me. I don’t know it is. We’ll find out though, I can assure you of that.”
In the eighth, LSU put runners on first and third with nobody out on singles by Kramer Robertson and Cole Freeman.
Antoine Duplantis struck out and Greg Deichmann, facing expected Wednesday starter Jackson Kowar, hit a first-pitch grounder to Florida first baseman J. Schwarz.
With Kramer Robertson running on contact, Florida catcher Mike Rivera caught a throw home and applied a tag as Robertson made a head-first slide and tried to get a hand on the plate.
“We felt snakebit right there, ” Mainieri said. “The way the game started defensively the first couple innings and those two innings offensively, just felt like it just maybe wasn’t meant to be for us tonight.”
In the eighth, Florida scored four runs off freshman reliever Zack Hess, whose other four appearances here came with LSU in the lead and for him to close out those victories.
A hit-by-pitch with the bases loaded gave Florida its first insurance run, and a two-run single by Deacon Liput blew open the game for the Gators to claim a first national championship.
That significantly dimmed whatever hopes LSU had of extending the season by another game. And soon after, the season ended.
