Kentucky Up 7-0 in Fourth, But Game Falls Short of Completion
LEXINGTON, Ky. – With Kentucky leading the No. 8 LSU Tigers 7-0 in the bottom of the fourth inning trying to cap off a three-game sweep, the finale of the series was placed into a delay for damp conditions and would not resume.
The game will officially go down as a no contest, and no stats will count.
There will be no make-up date.
NCAA rules require that each team get the opportunity to bat five times (home team four times if leading) in order for a game to count as an official contest. Since LSU only got four innings at the plate, it does not reach the proper qualification for an official game even though UK was winning, 7-0 at the time of interruption.
Kentucky raced out to a 4-0 lead thanks to an Abbey Cheek three-run home run off of Allie Walljasper in the bottom of the first and tacked on three more runs in the bottom of the second thanks to a Jenny Schaper RBI single in addition to a trio of LSU errors.
With Jenny Schaper on second and one out leading 7-0, Abbey Cheek stepped to the plate and a wild pitch was thrown by Carley Hoover to the backstop and Schaper advanced to third. The umpiring crew then decided to place the game into an official delay at 6:58 p.m. ET after a conversation with the LSU battery.
After the UK sports turf crew worked tirelessly to get the John Cropp Stadium field ready for action, the game was called due to league legislation at 8:54 p.m. ET, just shy of a two-hour delay.
UK claims its second-consecutive series sweep of LSU as a top-10 team, as in 2016 the Wildcats shut out the Tigers in three-straight games in Baton Rouge. Kentucky remains 2-3 in the SEC and 19-6 overall on the season.
Kentucky will return to action on Wednesday at 3 p.m. ET at Morehead State.
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