April 29, 2007
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Stanford, Calif. - Defending College World Series champion and No. 8 Oregon State (34-9, 6-6 Pac-10) held off a late comeback bid by Stanford (18-23, 3-12 Pac-10) in the rubber game of a three-game Pac-10 series at Sunken Diamond on Sunday. Stanford trailed 8-3 after six and a half innings but scored single runs in the seventh, eighth and ninth frames to get the winning run to the plate in the bottom of the ninth inning twice before Eddie Kunz finally shut the door by getting Randy Molina to ground out to Beaver second baseman Joey Wong to end the game.
Fresh off its dramatic 9-7 comeback win on Michael's Taylor's three-run walkoff homer in the bottom of the 11th inning Saturday, the Cardinal made another late run at the Beavers. Taylor started a ninth inning rally with the Cardinal down 8-5 with a one-out leadoff single off Beaver reliever Mark Grbavac (1.2 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 2 SO) before he was replaced by Kunz (0.2 IP, 2 H), who blew a save on Saturday by giving up a pair of runs to the Cardinal in the ninth to send the contest into extra innings. Stanford looked like it might be able to repeat its magic for a second straight day when Joey August and Adam Sorgi greeted Kuntz with back-to-back singles to load the bases and bring the winning run to the plate in Brian Juhl. Kunz recovered enough to get Juhl to hit a sacrifice fly to center field for the second out that brought home Taylor to pull the Cardinal within a two-run deficit before retiring Molina on the first pitch.
Stanford had started its comeback attempt with single runs in the seventh and eighth inning to cut Oregon State's lead to 8-5.
Back-to-back two-out doubles by Toby Gerhart and Taylor gave the Cardinal its seventh inning run.
In the eighth, Cord Phelps delivered a clutch two-out RBI single to score Sorgi after the Cardinal second baseman had led off the inning by drawing a walk and moving to second when Juhl also took four balls as a pinch-hitter.
Oregon State starter Jorge Reyes (3-0) earned the victory by limiting the Cardinal to a three-run bottom of the first inning before blanking Stanford for the remainder of his 6.0 inning outing. Reyes allowed eights hits and a walk, while striking out four. Kunz picked up his ninth save of the campaign.
The Beavers had home runs in the contest from Jason Ogata (3-4, 2B, HR, 2 RBI), Mike Lissman (3-4, HR, RBI) and Darwin Barney (2-4, HR, 3 RBI).
Sorgi (3-4, 2 RBI) and Molina (3-5, RBI) each had three-hit games for the Cardinal with Molina's three hits a season-best and Sorgi's equaling his season-high. Taylor (2-5, 2B, RBI) and Gerhart (2-5, 2B) added two hits apiece for Stanford.
Stanford starter Erik Davis (2-1) took his first loss of the season in the first Pac-10 start of his career, allowing six runs on five hits and four walks with three strikeouts in a 4.1 inning outing that was his longest of the campaign.
Oregon State jumped on the board in the top of the first inning when Ogata went deep with a two-run shot that also scored Chris Hopkins, who had walked to lead off the game.
Stanford answered right back with three runs in its half of the first to take a 3-2 lead. Sean Ratliff got the inning going with a leadoff double that extended his hit streak to a new career-high seven games before a Gerhart single and a walk to August two batters later loaded the bases for Sorgi, who delivered a two-run single. Molina capped the rally two batters later with a two-out RBI single.
Oregon State went back ahead 4-3 with two runs in the top of the second and would never trail again. Jordan Lennerton drew a leadoff walk and Lissman followed with a single before the runners moved up a base to second and third on Koa Kahalehoe's ground out. Drew George followed with an RBI single up the middle to tie the score at 3-3 and Hopkins hit a sacrifice fly to score Lissman and put the Beavers in front to stay.
The Beavers built their lead up to 8-3 with single runs in the third, fifth, sixth and seventh frames.
Ogata doubled to start the third inning before moving to third base on a fly out from Mitch Canham and scoring on Barney's sacrifice fly.
Oregon State played small ball for its fifth inning run when Hopkins walked to start the inning, moved to second on Wong's sacrifice bunt and scored two batters later on an RBI single from Barney.
The Beavers went from small to long ball in the sixth when Lissman led off the inning with a solo homer against Cory Bannister (1.2 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 SO) and then again in the seventh when Barney went deep off David Stringer (1.0 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 SO) with two outs and nobody on base.
Stanford will conclude a six-game homestand by hosting Santa Clara at Sunken Diamond on Tuesday, May 1 (6 pm, PT) before resuming Pac-10 action with a three-game series at Washington State next Saturday-Monday, May 5-7 (5:30 pm, 2 pm, 12 pm, PT).
Tickets for the Santa Clara game and all regular season Stanford Baseball home contests are available online at gostanford.com or by calling 1-800-STANFORD. On game days, tickets may be purchased at the Sunken Diamond Ticket Office window beginning one hour before first pitch. For group ticket information (groups of 10 or more), call 650-725-2876.