Hinds Community College’s road back to the World Series got a whole lot tougher Friday night.

LSU-Eunice scored five runs in the top of the first inning, then held off the Eagles’ comeback attempt to win 10-6 in a winners’ bracket game at the NJCAA Region XXIII tournament.

The loss means Hinds will have to win three consecutive elimination games — including two against LSU-Eunice, the No. 2 ranked team in the country and regional host — to reach the NJCAA Division II World Series for the second consecutive season.

Hinds (42-6) will play Northwest Mississippi today at 3 p.m., with the winner advancing to play LSU-Eunice at 7. If LSU-Eunice (43-9) loses, a winner-take-all championship game will be played Sunday at 1 p.m.

Hinds entered the tournament with the No. 1 ranking in the NJCAA Division II poll, but got off to a rough start against what was supposed to be the second-best team in the country.

An error brought in two runs, and a double by Jordan Romera plated two more as LSU-Eunice jumped out to a 5-0 lead. Steven Sensley’s RBI single in the second made it 6-0.

Hinds didn’t go away quietly. Matt Jones and Chase Lunceford hit two-run home runs in the third inning to cut it to 6-4.

The Bengals, though, got three runs in top of the fourth to push the lead back to five runs. The teams traded single runs after that, but Hinds never got closer than that two-run deficit in the third inning.

Jones finished the game 2-for-4 with three RBIs for Hinds, Casey Echols was 3-for-4 with two doubles and an RBI, and Jonathan Washam had two hits.

Brennan Bozeman and Cade Stone had two hits apiece for Eunice. Bozeman scored two runs and Stone scored three.