Arkansas faces LSU in CWS clash of SEC baseball powerhouses

BY DUDLEY E. DAWSON

The latest chapter in the storied Arkansas-LSU rivalry will take place this weekend on college baseball’s biggest stage – Omaha’s Charles Schwab Field.

The No. 3 Razorbacks (48-13) and No. 6 Tigers (48-15) will face each other Saturday night at 6 p.m. in the College World Series’ fourth and final round game.

The clash between the two SEC heavyweights will be televised in prime time by ESPN and played in front of what Arkansas head coach Dave Van Horn knows will be a packed crowd.

“The biggest battle is going to be who’s going to get the most seats, because I know both fan bases are amazing and will travel unbelievably,” Van Horn said. “I don’t know how 27-to-28,000 [tickets] will be enough.” 

LSU is making its 20th trip to the CWS while looking for its eighth national title while Arkansas is looking for its first in 12 trips.

The Razorbacks have earned a great measure of respect from Tigers head coach Jay Johnson, whose team took two of three from Arkansas in the regular season.

“I just think they are the most talented team in the country on both sides of the ball,” Johnson said. “They have a position player (Wehiwa Aloy) up for the Golden Spikes Award and the pitching that they continually run out, they always play defense and (are) athletically built.

“And as your are gong through the season, you say that’s definitely and Omaha team.

“We played well in that series, winning two out of three and even in the game we lost, we did some things well in that game.”

Johnson led LSU to the 2023 national championship and also brought Arizona to Omaha twice.

His teams had to go through the losers bracket each time.

“I made this comment the other day; I would like to try this thing through the winners’ bracket once,” Johnson said. “That would be awesome. But I feel our team is built for anything.”

The winner of the Arkansas-LSU game will play Monday at 6 p.m. against UCLA, (48-16) who downed Murray State 6-4 on Saturday afternoon.

The loser of Saturday night’s game will face Murray State (44-15) Monday at 1 p.m. in an elimination game.

“You know a challenge is around the corner,” Johnson said. “We’ll have one Saturday. We’ll have one Monday. And you try to take it a pitch at a time and not get too far ahead of yourself.”

Winning the first game is of great benefit as Saturday’s loser would have to play and win Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday to make the championship 2-of-3 series.

“If you’re on our side of the bracket and you lose one of the first two, there’s no more days off and you play straight through,” Johnson said.

“I think, and kind of going back to that previous question, playing four days in a row, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, you have to be on everything in terms of rest, recovery, how you set your pitching, matching up.”

The game will feature a rematch of two of nation’s best left handed pitchers and Major League Baseball Draft prospects.

The Razorbacks’ Zach Root (8-5, 3.59 ERA) and Tigers’ Kade Anderson (10-1, 3.58) are slated to open the contest.

Root pitched six innings while allowing two runs on five hits, fanning six and throwing 91 pitches in the team’s first match up this season.

Anderson went 5 2/3 innings, gave up three runs, fanned 10 and walking one while throwing 109 pitches.

LSU rallied from two runs down after Anderson left to win 5-4 in 10 innings.

It was a game that started just before 10 p.m. after an rain delay and and ended at 1:16 a.m.

Anderson has fanned 163 batters this season, the third best in school history behind Paul Skenes (209 in 2023) and Ben McDonald (202 in 1989).

“We know what our plan is,” Van Horn said. “(Anderson’s) a tall lefty that throws down hill and he doesn’t walk very many people. We have to do like we did last time and we got to fight him.

“That’s easier said than done. He’s awfully good, but we have good hitters that are confident an the good thing is we have left handed hitters that can hit left handed pitching.”

“At least statistically we have showed that up to now. As a coach, I don’t feel like I have to trade out hitters. We just basically play our starters and go from there.”

Van Horn stressed his team just needs to keep playing like it has been during a 5-0 stretch this postseason.

“I think its just real important, like I was mentioning earlier, you can’t make mistakes and you can’t change the way you have been swinging all year,” Van Horn said. “It would mess them up, I would feel like.

“You have got to to be able to get from first to third and you get a runner at third with less than two (outs) and you have got to get him in.

“You have got to find ways to score instead of just hitting home runs and we have had many a game that we have done that. We have hit our share, but we don’t just wait on it.”

“We try to create innings with long at bats, fouling off pitches and taking a walk. If you can get a single here or there, advancing runners here or there. You gotta score.

Van Horn noted that you can’t be concerned whether the wind is blowing in or out at Charles Schwab Field.

“You just can’t worry about it,” Van Horn noted. “That’s why you hit the middle of the baseball and good things happen.”

Anderson’s last outing was in his team’s Super Regional opener against West Virginia and was statistically his worst of the season as he gave up 7 runs on 9 hits and throwing 113 pitches in 7 innings.

“Having those experiences and learning from them as well, I think those type of things prepare you for the playoffs,” Anderson said. “And this is just another week for us, realistically. Coach Johnson prepares us that way. And we’ll be ready when it comes Saturday.”