Cats one strike from victory

It was a tough loss to swallow.

Long after a Matt Clark 350-foot shot over the right-field wall gave Louisiana State a 9-8 win over Kentucky on Sunday, UK players sat silently in their dugout.

Heads were down, eyes were fixed somewhere in space.

It was the second hard-to-swallow loss in as many days for the No. 16 Cats, who are now fighting for their lives to stay in the hunt for a berth in the Southeastern Conference Tournament.

On Saturday, it was an alleged errant slide that handed LSU the victory. Sunday, it was an errant pitch by reliever Andrew Albers that allowed for Clark's two-run homer in the top of the ninth inning.

"You do all of the right things, and things still go bad for you," UK Coach John Cohen said. "You can't assume you're just snakebitten, but in some ways we were a little bit snakebitten."

Cohen thought Albers had struck out Derek Helenihi, the batter before Clark, but after 10 pitches Helenihi earned a walk with two outs.

"We were one strike away from the ball game being over," Cohen said.

Kentucky had a five-run lead after five innings thanks to a three-run home run by Keenan Wiley that broke open a back-and-forth game.

But LSU, which has won nine in a row, stayed composed.

"Earlier in the season, we'd be pressing at the plate, just trying to manufacture runs," Clark said. "But as of late, we've got confidence in our offense and we know we're going to get some runs."

The Tigers got them back in little chunks, grabbing two in the sixth on a two-run single by Ryan Schimpf and then two more in the eighth inning on RBI singles by Clark and Schimpf.

Clark added his parting shot in the ninth, taking a curveball up the middle and slamming it out of Cliff Hagan Stadium.

"He made a bad pitch there," Cohen said of Albers, "but he's made a helluva a lot of good pitches in the last two weeks."

When asked if he knew it was gone as soon as it hit the bat, Clark said: "I knew before it hit the bat.

"This is the best one of the whole year," he said of his 17th homer. "It's the one I've been waiting on."

Albers (6-3) took the loss, giving up five hits and two earned runs. Starter Greg Dombrowski allowed eight hits and three earned runs in six full innings.

The Tigers' Daniel Bradshaw (4-5) earned the win, giving up one hit and striking out four. Eleven of the Cats' 15 hits came against starter Jordan Brown.

Bryan Rose paced Kentucky with a career-best four hits in five at-bats.

Cohen said he doesn't need to remind his team that it was just one or two bad bounces from taking two out of three in the series against the SEC's hottest team.

But it was painful for players and coach alike to be swept at home for the first time since 2004, the year Cohen took over the program.

It also leaves little room for similar miscues in the final six regular-season SEC games.

After Tennessee was swept by Vanderbilt at home this weekend, the Vols and Cats are knotted at 11-13 and battling it out for the eighth and final spot in the SEC Tournament.

It will make this weekend's three-game series in Knoxville that much more interesting.

After that, UK has three league games versus No. 25 Ole Miss. The Rebels also have what is considered one of the best pitchers in the league in Lance Lynn.

"It's disappointing because our kids deserve more than that," Cohen said after the loss Sunday. "But that's how cruel this league can be and we need to get ready to compete our tails off in the next six games."