Lucchesi sets records as Southeast Missouri State baseball beats Belmont

Southeast Missouri State baseball coach Steve Bieser could laugh about it after the fact, but it caused him some unease when he walked out to the mound in the top of the third to talk to starting pitcher Joey Lucchesi with the bases loaded and one out in a tie ballgame against Belmont.

Before Bieser said anything to his left-handed ace, Lucchesi assured his coach that he wasn't worried, that he could get out of the jam.

Lucchesi struck out the next batter following that meeting, and after he'd retired Brennan Washington, who'd hit a homer off him the inning before, he turned and took a few steps toward the dugout. But he still had one out to record.

No problem for Lucchesi.

He struck out the next batter and 12 others in the contest, breaking both the school and Ohio Valley Conference's single-season records as the Redhawks beat the Bruins 9-2.

"It's just a great season for Joey," Bieser said of the defending OVC Pitcher of the Year and the nation's strikeout leader. "It's hard to do it one time, but to come back and do it the second time when people are gunning for you every time you go out and they want to make a statement; for him to come back and not only throw as well as he did last year but his numbers are better than they were last year. He's been outstanding all season and now we get down to his next start. It's going to be the biggest start of his college career and I'm excited to see how he's going to respond to it."

Lucchesi's next start will come in the Redhawks' first game of the OVC tournament.

Members of the Southeast Missouri State baseball team celebrate their third consecutive Ohio Valley Conference championship following Thursday's 9-2 victory over Belmont at Capaha Field. Wayne McPherson ~ Special to the Southeast Missourian

Southeast improved to 35-16 and 22-7 in the OVC with Thursday night's victory. The Redhawks had already clinched their third consecutive OVC regular-season championship and No. 1 seed in next week's tournament on Monday after Austin Peay vacated four conference games, but celebrated with a dogpile on Capaha Field anyway.

"Just a special night to go out and win the game, and really what I tried to talk about was the fact that there is another team that won 21 games and we're sitting at 21 games [coming into Thursday's game] and it's something to be proud of," Bieser said. "We go out and win 22 and it doesn't matter what the technicalities were before -- it's no doubt that we won the most games in the conference and we deserve to be the conference champs no matter what."

Lucchesi struck out the first three batters he faced in the game before Washington led off the second inning with a home run. Clay Payne followed with a double and scored on a sacrifice fly to put the Bruins up 2-0 after 1 1/2 innings.

Southeast tied it up in the home half. Garrett Gandolfo led off with a single and Dan Holst drew a walk before being bunted into scoring position. Scott Mitchell hit an RBI single and Brian Lees plated a run when he reached on a fielder's choice.

Lucchesi struck out the first batter in the third. A single and a wild pitch put a runner on second before Gandolfo made a diving stop to his right at first, but the runner reached when Lucchesi didn't cover the base. He issued a walk to load them before Bieser came out for their one-on-one talk.

"Just challenged him to get it right," Bieser said. "People are here making decisions on your future and you're just kind of going through the motions. He responded outstanding to the challenge and we saw what happened after that."

Lucchesi struck out the next two and only allowed three base runners over the next three innings.

"I wasn't really pitching like myself there," Lucchesi said of the third inning. "I was being soft, I would say, and he just kind of kicked my butt in gear. It's what I needed. I should've been pitching like that the whole game."

He broke Southeast's single-season record of 130 strikeouts set by Ryan Spille in 1998 with a called third strike to end the fourth.

He struck out Washington to start the sixth, breaking the OVC record set by Tennessee Tech's Todd Kemp in 1986 with his 134th strikeout of the season. He finished the game with 136.

He improved to 9-4 with the victory, allowing two earned runs on six hits with two walks and 13 Ks in six innings. Aaron Quillen (5-4) took the loss for Belmont, giving up eight earnd runs on eight hits with two walks and five strikeouts in his four-inning outing.

The Redhawks took the lead for good on a towering home run to right by Chris Osborne -- his team-leading 14th of the season -- in the bottom of the third. Gandolfo, who went 3-for-4 with four RBIs, hit a two-out solo shot to left to make it 4-2 after three.

Trevor Ezell and Branden Boggetto each had RBI singles in the fourth and Gandolfo plated two more with a double to right to extend Southeast's lead to 8-2.

"I've been struggling for a couple weeks and my swing hasn't felt good, so I just kind of had to rely on pitch selection and I got some good pitches to hit today," Gandolfo said. "I just wanted to be aggressive."

Lees singled to start the sixth, Ezell drew a walk and Boggetto was hit by a pitch before a groundout scored Southeast's final run.

Righty Jacob Lawrence pitched a perfect final three innings for Southeast, striking out seven of the nine batters he faced as he recorded his second save.

"Just wonderful. That's fantastic," Bieser said. "One of the best performances I've seen out of the bullpen in a long time. The reason I say that is it's hard to come in in a 9-2 game and have that type of intensity and focus and pinpoint control like he did. ... Every pitch he threw he threw exactly where he wanted to throw it and that was exciting for me to see."

Southeast and Belmont (29-25, 15-13 OVC) face off in Game 2 of the series at 6 p.m. today.

"We're on our way back up," Gandolfo said when asked how he felt about the team. "We haven't played our best baseball as of late, but I like to see us keep making improvements and continually get hot."