HOOVER, Ala. -- University of Arkansas pitchers Hagen Smith and Hunter Hollan reversed roles against LSU on Thursday night from the teams' matchup at Baton Rouge on March 24, but the result was the same.
Smith and Hollan helped the Razorbacks beat the Tigers.
With Smith starting and Hollan pitching in relief, No. 4 Arkansas beat No. 3 LSU 5-4 in the SEC Tournament at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium.
The Razorbacks (41-15) advanced to the tournament semifinals, where they'll play at noon today.
When Arkansas opened its regular-season series at LSU with a 9-3 victory in 10 innings, Hollan started and went 5 1/3 scoreless innings. Smith pitched the final 4 2/3 innings.
Smith started Thursday's game and pitched 3 2/3 innings before Hollan (8-2) went the final 5 1/3.
"In my opinion -- at least who we saw, and we didn't play everybody -- Smith and Hollan are the two best guys we saw all year," LSU Coach Jay Johnson said. "So that's twice that they've used both of them against us to win.
"I think that speaks a lot about our team offensively that it takes two pitchers like that to hold us down, and credit to them for doing a good job." Smith and Hollan combined for 17 strikeouts -- 9 for Smith against 16 batters he faced and 8 for Hollan against 21.
"They have four pitches that they can execute, and it's like that's what you have to have, the pile-up of strikeouts against us, and they executed very, very well," Johnson said. "They're two of the best left-handed pitchers in college baseball." Hollan, whose first 14 games this season were starts, said Thursday night "was my first time coming out of the bullpen since probably junior year of high school," but that he didn't change his approach.
"You've just got to come in with the mindset that I'm going to compete in the zone and go with the game plan that you want," Hollan said. "We had a really good game plan the first time we played them and we kind of stuck to that, and it worked out." Smith, who earlier in the season was pitching out of the bullpen, made his 10th start.
"Me and Hunter actually talked about that this morning at practice," said Smith said, who joined LSU right-hander Paul Skenes as the All-SEC first-team starting pitchers in a vote by the conference coaches. "We were talking about how the roles were switched, and I thought Hunter did an amazing job, honestly, coming in behind me and pounding the zone, getting me the outs." Arkansas sent 10 batters to the plate in the fourth inning when the Razorbacks scored all five of their runs to take a 5-2 lead with the help of a catcher's interference call.