McEwen homers in series-opening loss at LSU

BATON ROUGE, La. — Freshman Hannah McEwen extended her hitting streak to eight games with a game-tying home run Friday evening at LSU, but Arkansas dropped a 2-1 decision in the series opener.

The host Tigers came away with the win on a walk-off home run in the bottom of the seventh.

With the setback, the Razorbacks are 37-12 overall with a 12-10 mark in SEC play.

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Game two of the weekend series between Arkansas and LSU is scheduled for Saturday at 6 p.m. and will be streamed live on the SEC Network+ through the WatchESPN app.

Sunday’s series finale will be televised on ESPNU at 3 p.m.

After the home team scored an early run, the Razorbacks put together a scoring threat of their own in the top of the second.

With runners on first and second, senior Loren Krzysko laid down a sacrifice bunt to move them both into scoring position.

Fellow senior Tori Cooper drew a walk of her own to load the bases with one out but LSU (38-13, 11-10 SEC) worked its way out of the jam without allowing a run.

The home team put runners in scoring position in the third and fourth innings but each time freshman Mary Haff worked her way out of trouble.

In the fourth, she tallied a pair of strikeouts including one with the bases loaded to end the inning.

With five strikeouts in the game, Haff pushed her season total to 216 which is three behind Katy Henry (2006) for third place on the program’s single-season list.

McEwen led off the next half inning with a solo shot to right center to tie the game.

The freshman took the 3-1 offering from LSU starter Allie Walljasper and deposited it into the bleachers for her team-leading 11th home run of the season.

The home run was her fifth since moving to the lead-off spot April 10 at Saint Louis.

Despite both teams putting runners on in each of their times at the plate, the game was tied at 1-all heading to the seventh.

To lead off the frame, McEwen laced a potential extra-base hit headed down the line in right field but was retired on a nice jumping snag at first.

With one down, Autumn Buczek stood on second after an errant throw to first but she was left stranded at third to end the scoring chance.