Flames allow late rally, fall twice on Saturday as LA Tech extinguishes CUSA Tournament run (2024)

By the time Louisiana Tech's Grant Comeaux stepped into the box with runners on first and second in the bottom on the 10th, Liberty reliever Cale Bolton's magnificent start felt like a distant memory.

The junior pitcher got the first start in his Liberty career in the team's biggest game of the season on Saturday night and didn't look like a first-timer in his6 ⅓ innings of work against conference's top hitting team.

But all that was gone.

The Bulldogs chipped two runs off of Bolton before the book was closed on him. They scratched three more across in the eighth off of Garrett McLaughlin, and squandered opportunities by both teams brought the game to Comeaux and Liberty reliever Dylan Mathiesen's hands.

The Louisiana Tech redshirt freshman seized the opportunity, grounding a ball back up the middle to plate Tech's pinch runner and send the Bulldogs into the Conference USA championship game on Sunday against Dallas Baptist with the 6-5 win.

The Flames' furious tournament run fell two wins shy of a CUSA title and an automatic berth into the NCAA Regionals next weekend.Liberty's Saturday started needing one win in two games to move on to Sunday. The day concluded as an end to its season.

In the opening game of the day, both offenses came out with their bats on fire, trading leads in each of the first three innings to the tune of 11 runs.

But it was Louisiana Tech(45-16) which settled in first, opening up a three-run lead in the middle innings before holding on to an 8-7 victory.

Leading 6-5 in the fourth, the Bulldogs got a key run across on a fielders' choice that scored Tech's two-way player Ethan Bates. Two innings later, he came around to score again on a wild pitch to open up a three-run lead for his squad.

Those runs later proved to be crucial.

Down 8-5, Liberty's Aidan Sweatt drove a two-run homer to left field to give Liberty a clean slate in the ninth, needing just one run to tie it up with all three outs remaining.

After the homer the man who scored the big runs for Tech was called on to finish it.

Bates surrendered a single to Hudson but otherwise slammed the door shut on Liberty's hopes in the afternoon game to set up a winner-take-all semifinal.

In the nightcap, Liberty looked prime to extend its stay in Ruston, Louisiana through the first four frames. The Flames had gotten a two-run home run by John Simmons in the second, who later drove in another run in the fourth along with Camden Troyer.

The Bulldogs inched closer to the Flames in the fifth and seventh, using a solo home run by Dalton Davis and later a fielder's choice by Adarius Myers that scored Bates.

The fielder's choice closed the book on Bolton's start that gave Liberty life in the semifinal, which was celebrated by a line of handshakes by his teammates as he exited the field. He tossed6 ⅓ innings, working around eight Bulldog hits to allow just two runs with one walk and six strikeouts. He threw 113 pitches on the evening, nearly double his previous season-high of 62.

In the eighth, Liberty worked itself into a situation that showed potential for multiple insurance runs. Noah Rabon and Troyer had each singled to begin the inning and to the plate came third baseman Cam Foster with no outs.

Foster worked a 3-0 count but grounded the very next pitch to the shortstop for the first two outs of the inning. With the middle of Tech's defense at double-play depth, Rabon came home to score to give Liberty a 5-2 lead. But the bases were cleared for the Bulldogs who got Simmons to ground out to end the frame.

Louisiana Tech didn't miss its chances in the home half of the inning, putting runners on first and third with one out. They plated the first of three runs on a single by Cole McConnell and Jorge Corona evened the game at 5 with a two-RBI double that kissed the foul line in right field.

Still, emblematic of their run in the CUSA tournament after stumbling down the stretch of the regular season, the Flames didn't quit.

For the second time on the day, the Bulldogs called on Bates, the country's saves leader and the CUSA Player of the Year for his two-way prowess, in the ninth. This time, Liberty loaded the bases up on a single and two walks to chase him for reliever Nate Crider.

The Tech reliever pulled off the escape of the evening, getting Macaddin Dye to strikeout looking and a ground-ball double play by Todd Hudson to walk away unscathed.

Liberty pushed for one more rally in the top of the 10th, moving Rabon over to third with just one out. But Crider worked out of it again.

It was Liberty that just couldn't work their way out of the home half of the 10th, letting up a single and a walk to set up Comeaux's game-winning single.

Simmons, Rabon and Troyer led the Flames with two hits each, while Simmons knocked in three runs. Troyer capped off his tournament with another RBI, giving him 10 in four games while going 7 for 18.

The Bulldog win sets up a one-versus-two matchup in the Conference USA title game between Louisiana Tech and second-seeded Dallas Baptist (43-13), two teams likely bound for an NCAA Regional appearance regardless of Sunday's result.

The Flames (24-34) will miss a regional appearance for the second straight season after appearing in three consecutive tournaments from 2019 to 2022.