Box Score SUGAR LAND, Texas – McNeese was awarded the 2017 Southland Conference regular season championship trophy along with the all-conference players being presented their plaques prior to Wednesday's first pitch of the Cowboys-Lamar Southland Conference game.
 
Big plays in clutch situations have been key ingredients to the Cowboys' success this season
 
Dustin Duhon and Austin Nelson blasted solo home runs, Rickey Ramirez, Jr. popped a two-run single, Trent Fontenot fanned a batter on a 3-2 count with no outs and the bases loaded, and Collin Kober struck out the only two batters he faced in the top of the ninth inning as the No. 1-seeded McNeese Cowboys prevailed behind more key plays in crucial moments for a 7-5 win in Wednesday's first round of the Southland Conference Tournament.
 
McNeese (37-18) will play Central Arkansas, a 15-4, 7-inning winner over Houston baptist, in a winner's bracket game at 7 p.m. on Thursday night. Lamar (33-24) will take on HBU at noon in an elimination contest.
 
Grant Anderson (8-0) picked up the win after relieving starter Austin Sanders with one out in the fifth inning. Anderson was far from his usual dominating self after he walked four batters, allowed two hits, one run and did not strike out a hitter in his 2 2/3 innings of action.
 
"We have a lot of guys banged up right now," said head coach Justin Hill who has led the Cowboys to their second consecutive first round win in the conference tournament. "Austin had to come out. He kind of hit a wall today. There have been quite a few things going on just by a physical sickness things they've been going through,"
 
Whatever has been ailing the conference regular season champions wasn't enough to pull the Cowboys down when they couldn't put away their arch rivals after taking several multi-run leads throughout the game.
 
"That's what makes me even more proud of them," said Hill about his team's perseverance. "There was nothing pretty about what we did today other than that we won. We walked more guys than we have all year. But it really didn't matter. It was a gutsy performance by everybody, we just found a way to do it."
 
Duhon put the Cowboys on the board in the first innings when the sophomore catcher, the number two hole hitter in the lineup, sailed his third home run of the season over the left field wall for a 1-0 lead.
 
"I knew I hit it good," said Duhon. "It felt good coming off the bat. I just didn't think it had enough to go over."
 
The next inning, there was no doubting Nelson's homer that easily cleared the 20-foot tall, dead center field wall at the 405-foot mark to put McNeese up 2-0 through two innings.
 
Lamar got a run back in the third after Reid Russell walked then scored on a Robin Adames single to make it 2-1.
 
McNeese had a big inning working in the fourth with a couple of hits and three batters walking to score two runs and go up 4-1, but again, Lamar battled back with two runs in the fifth to cut the gap to 4-3.
 
Anderson was brought in with runners on first and third with one out and gave up a RBI single to Adames that scored the third run of the game for the Cardinals, a run that was charged to Sanders. But on the next at-bat, Anderson got Bryundan Arrendondo to ground into a 463 double play to end the Lamar threat.
 
The Cowboys got another double play after a lead-off walk in the seventh was followed with a second 463 double play to help silence the Lamar offense.
 
The half-inning prior Will Fox, who finished the day 3-for-3 with two runs scored, led-off the bottom of the sixth with a double to left field. After Robbie Podorsky (2-for-4) drew a walk, Duhon advanced both runners with a sacrifice bunt.
 
Ramirez, Jr. knocked both runners in with a single to right-center field to make it 6-3 before a pitching change from starter Carson Lance to reliever Brett Brown led to the final two outs of the inning.
 
Things looked good for the Cowboys after a seventh-inning RBI single by Podorsky scored Nelson to make it 7-3 but a flurry of walks in the eighth and ninth innings, five total in the two frames, allowed the Cardinals to breath a sign of life.
 
In the eighth, Russell led off the inning for Lamar with a single. That was followed by back-to-back walks to load the bases. After Anderson went 2-0 in the count to Trey Silvers, Hill made the call to the bullpen for Fontenot who came in and finished off the at-bat by walking Silvers to score a run and making it 7-4. The walk and run would be charged to Anderson.
 
Fontenot faced a full count on the next batter and the risk of walking in a second run of the frame, but the next pitch would be swung on and missed by Cole Coker for the out. A fly out to left field and grounder to second base followed as Fontenot pitched the Cowboys out of the inning and possibly changed the momentum of the game.
 
"That was such a big pitch," said Hill of Fontenot's third strike for the first out in the eighth. "It seemed like every pitch was critical. (Lamar) Second baseman is going to be a good player. It was one of those deals where he (Fontenot) just made one more pitch.
 
"That was a huge moment," said Hill. "There were other moments but we needed that one."
 
Fontenot found trouble in the ninth after he walked two of the first three batters then gave up a run-scoring single to make it 7-5 with one out.
 
Kober came in the game with runners on first and second and the go-ahead run at the plate and swiftly struck out the next two batters to pick up his ninth save of the season.
 
"I don't think there was a more appropriate moment than that one," said Hill of the two Kober strike outs to end the game. "If we were going to win the ballgame or lose the ballgame, that was the guy we wanted on the mound."
 
The Cowboys finished the day with 11 hits in the contest, five going for extra-bases.
 
In addition to Nelson and Duhon's home runs, Mitchell Rogers and Fox had doubles while Joe Provenzano had a triple.
 
Ramirez also had a 2-for-2 day with two RBI in the game.
 
Adames led Lamar's 7-hit attack with a 3-for-4 game with three RBI.