The University of Louisiana baseball team was out-hit for the first time in the 2005 season Saturday, even with ace pitcher Kevin Ardoin on the mound.

But quality is more important than quantity, and because of that the Ragin' Cajuns are still unbeaten heading into today's final day of the UL Invitational Tournament.

The Cajuns only got seven hits, but many of those came at opportune times, and the hosts also took advantage of St. John's mistakes in a 7-2 win over the Red Storm.

UL (5-0) scored one run in the first and two in the seventh, both without benefit of a hit. The hosts' biggest rally, a three-run outburst in the third inning, included only two hits.

"We got big hits," said Cajun coach Tony Robichaux. "We had good pitching, good defense and timely hits, and I'll take that over a 12- or 13-hit game every time."

The good pitching came mostly from Ardoin, who scattered seven hits and fanned six over seven innings in his second straight quality start.

"Give him a lot of credit," said Red Storm coach Ed Blankmeyer, whose team fell to 0-2 after a 6-5 loss to Northwestern State Friday in the tournament opener. "He did a good job of keeping us off balance. But we didn't help ourselves ... we basically gave them five of those runs."

St. John's committed three errors and all three directly contributed to multi-run innings for the Cajuns, who wrap up their own tournament today at 4 p.m. against Northwestern.

That was more than enough for Ardoin (2-0), who should have turned in a second straight scoreless outing but was victimized by a defensive mixup in the first inning that gave the Storm a 1-0 lead.

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Dan McDonald
dmcdonald@theadvertiser.com