April 13, 2023

Emilien Pitre Has Four Hits in Series Opener Against No. 1 LSU

By Matt May

University of Kentucky

BATON ROUGE, La. – The No. 1 team in the country played to that lofty ranking, scoring 14 runs in the first three innings of a 16-6 victory over No. 11 Kentucky at Alex Box Stadium on Thursday night.

The Tigers took advantage of a bevy of self-inflicted mistakes and scored 13 two-out runs in the game. UK pitchers hit five LSU batters in those early innings, a fly ball was lost in the sun that dropped for a hit and a fielding error directly led to a pair of grand slams and a three-run home run for the Tigers.

The Cats fell to 27-6 overall and 9-4 in Southeastern Conference play.

UK was up against arguably the top prospect for the 2023 MLB Draft in pitcher Paul Skenes and held its own. The Cats pounded out the most hits (seven) and earned runs (four) in a game against the right-hander with a 100 MPH fastball and devastating slider who leads the nation in strikeouts. Previously, he had not allowed more than five hits or two earned runs in a game.

Hitting clean-up sophomore 2B Emilien Pitre (Repentigny, Que.) had three of those hits off Skenes on his way to a perfect 4-for-4 night with three RBIs.

NOTES

Kentucky is 34-9 over its last 43 games dating to last season.

UK is 18-10 in its last 28 games vs. SEC opponents.

UK is 13-18 all-time vs. No. 1-ranked teams.

UK is 9-31-1 all-time in Baton Rouge.

UK Coach Nick Mingione is in his seventh season at the helm and now owns a 203-135 career record.

INF Emilien Pitre went 4-for-4 with two runs, three RBIs and a double.

Pitre had his 10th multi-hit game of the season and three hits off LSU ace Paul Skenes.

He had a two-run double that gave him 11 multi-RBI games this season.