LSU claims College World Series

Published 12:38 am Thursday, June 25, 2009

OMAHA, Neb. — LSU, which two years ago wasn’t good enough to qualify for its conference tournament, is the best team in college baseball again.

The Tigers won their sixth national title Wednesday night, breaking open Game 3 of the College World Series finals with a five-run sixth inning that carried them to an 11-4 victory over Texas.

Jared Mitchell hit a three-run homer in the first inning as LSU (56-17) built a 4-0 lead. Texas (50-16-1) pulled even, but Mikie Mahtook’s tie-breaking double ignited the Tigers’ big sixth against the mistake-prone Longhorns.

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‘‘It’s everybody pulling together, a sense of urgency we had, and we began to play our best ball at the end of the year,’’ said Mitchell, voted the CWS Most Outstanding Player.

Mitchell added to the title he earned as a wide receiver on the 2007 LSU team that won the BCS championship. Earlier this month, he was drafted by the Chicago White Sox in the first round.

It was the first national title for coach Paul Mainieri, who played his freshman year at LSU in 1976 and returned to the school after coaching stops at St. Thomas (Fla.), Air Force and Notre Dame.