April 29, 2001
Stanford, Calif. - Mike Gosling tossed his first career shutout and third-ranked Stanford (34-12, 12-6 Pac-10) scored six times in the seventh inning to lead the Cardinal to an 8-0 victory over California (26-22, 11-10 Pac-10) at Evans Diamond on Sunday. Gosling (5-0) struck out 10 batters and allowed only four hits as he won his fifth consecutive Pac-10 game, including four straight starting assignments. Gosling set the Golden Bears down in order in four of his last five innings, retiring 18 of the final 20 batters he faced. Gosling also recorded his second straight complete game and has now thrown 15.0 consecutive scoreless innings.
Stanford remained in second-place in the Pac-10 race, 1.0 game behind first-place USC (32-16, 13-5 Pac-10). The Trojans swept UCLA at Dedeaux Field this weekend to move past the Cardinal, who lost the first two games of the California series. Both teams have six remaining Pac-10 contests. The victory helped the Cardinal avoid being swept for the first time since 1997 and marked the seventh time in 2001 that the Cardinal has blanked an opponent.
"We needed this game," emphasized Gosling. "It was great when we put up that six-run inning, but I still wanted to go out there and pitch like it was a 1-0 game."
"Mike Gosling has given us a great pitching performance two weeks in a row when we really needed it," said Stanford head coach Mark Marquess, bringing up Gosling's complete game victory at USC in his previous start. "Cal handled us pretty well in the first two games of the series but today Gosling pitched a superb game and we got some key hits."
Carlos Quentin (3-5, 2 2B) led Stanford's offense and had two of the Cardinal's season-high six doubles.
The Cardinal led just 1-0 with Gosling and California's David Cash locked in a pitchers dual until Stanford scored six times with two outs in the seventh inning. The Cardinal loaded the bases with one out on singles by Quentin and Jonny Ash, and an intentional pass to Brian Hall. However, Cash struck out Andy Topham to record the second out before Sam Fuld hit a key two-RBI single up the middle to give Stanford a pair of insurance runs. Chris O'Riordan followed with an RBI single to score Fuld. Ryan Garko brought home O'Riordan with an RBI double before Jason Cooper's RBI single scored Garko and ended the Cardinal eruption.
Stanford added an insurance run in the top of the eighth inning when Topham drove home Scott Dragicevich with a sacrifice fly.
Stanford's first run came on back-to-back two-out doubles by Quentin and Ash in the top of the fourth inning.
California had runners in scoring position in the second, third and fourth innings but did not score.
Dragicevich (2-3, 2 2B), Fuld (2-5, 2 RBI), Ash (2-5, 2B, RBI) and O'Riordan (2-5, RBI) added two hits each for the Cardinal. California did not have a player with more than one hit.
Cash (8-3) took the loss for California, allowing eight hits and six runs in 6.2 innings.
Stanford will host Santa Clara this Tuesday, May 1 (6:00 p.m., PDT) and then play Sacramento State at Raley Field on Wednesday, May 2 (6:30 p.m., PDT). Stanford will be out of Pac-10 action next weekend before returning to Sunken Diamond for a non-conference game against Cal Poly on Tuesday, May 8 (6:00 p.m., PDT).