Junior Joe Robbins and senior Brian Mills combined for seven RBI as the 22nd-ranked Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns baseball team defeated No.22/24 Tulane Tuesday night at M.L. “Tigue” Moore Field.
Robbins went 3-for-4 in the game with a home run, four RBI and scored twice, while Mills was 2-for-3 with two doubles, three RBI, a walk and scored a run.
The win evens the season series for the Cajuns (22-11, 10-5 Sun Belt) against the Green Wave (21-11, 3-2 American). Louisiana has now won 10 of its last 12 contests including the last five games at The Tigue.
“Our hitters did an exceptional job tonight,” head coach Tony Robichaux said. “Evan (Guillory) did a good job of keeping the ball down with a strong wind blowing out and pitched well. Hopefully we can ride this momentum when we get back out on the road tomorrow.
“We dropped Joe a little bit to maybe get him going, and he got on one early in the game and was swinging hard. We won one going away this past weekend, and then we were able to do that again today. Hopefully we can do that again tomorrow.”
Guillory had another strong outing on the mound limiting Tulane to two runs on six hits in seven innings to improve to 3-3 on the year. Guillory struck out six in his fourth quality start of the year and did not allow a free pass.
Senior Eric Carter threw two scoreless innings to close out the contest in relief. Carter posted five strikeouts in the contest and has 10 in his last two outings.
Green Wave starter J.P. France (2-1) suffered his first loss of the season giving up seven runs (six earned) on five hits with three walks and three strikeouts in 3.1 innings.
Robbins gave the Cajuns a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first as he crushed a 0-2 pitch from France off of the scoreboard in left field for a two-run homer. The home run is the eighth of the season for Robbins.
Louisiana extended its advantage to 5-0 in the bottom of the third. Mills doubled home the first run of the inning driving a ball down the left field line off of France. After the Cajuns loaded the bases with one out, Robbins roped a two-run single into left field to give the Ragin’ Cajuns a five-run edge.
Mills tacked on two more runs in the bottom of the fourth with another double down the left field line to make the score 7-0.
Tulane got on the board in the top of the fifth on a two-out RBI double by Jake Willsey to cut the Louisiana lead to 7-1.
The Ragin’ Cajuns put the game out of reach in the bottom half of the fifth adding two runs on a sacrifice fly to left by Nick Thurman and a wild pitch by Green Wave reliever Patrick Duester to go ahead 9-1.
Hunter Hope capped the scoring in the contest with a solo home run to right center in the top of the seventh to make the final 9-2.
Louisiana returns to action tomorrow at 6:30 p.m. as the Cajuns head to New Orleans, La. to face the Privateers at Maestri Field.
