May 3, 2011
SAN JOSE, Calif.-- Dean McArdle (6-2) twirled his longest outing in a month, 5.1 innings, as three pitchers combined on a seven-hitter and No. 28-ranked Stanford (22-16) defeated host San Jose State (30-17) 3-1 on Tuesday.
McArdle, who lost his weekend spot in the rotation two weeks ago, allowed one unearned run on three hits, at one point retiring 11 in a row, before A.J. Vanegas followed with 1.2 scoreless innings and Chris Reed secured his fifth save with four strikeouts.
Reed pitched a perfect eighth, and following a lead off single on the first pitch of the ninth, struck out the side in the ninth.
McArdle dominated early. He gave up a hit to start his night, and then not another one until the fifth. After hitting a batter to lead off the second, McArdle retired the next 11 in a row, until a two-out double in the fifth. He allowed another hit in the sixth and dropped a pop up on the infield, which eventually came around to score and make it 2-1 on a Jason Martin two-out RBI single off of Vanegas.
Vanegas though got an inning ending groundout to end the sixth, before working out of a jam in the seventh, after Stanford added a run on an RBI single from Tyler Gaffney. The freshman righthander left the tying runs on base with an inning ending strikeout of Andrew Rodriguez to keep it at 3-1.
Runs in the fourth and sixth gave Stanford a 2-0 lead.
Zach Jones doubled in the fourth and then following a ground out, scored on a Brian Ragira fly out to center to make it 1-0. Ragira then scored in the sixth to make it 2-0, singling, stealing second, moving to third on a ground out and scoring on a Eric LeBaron wild pitch.
Roberto Padilla (8-4) went the first five innings, giving up the first run on three hits for the loss.
NOTES Stanford hosts Washington this weekend with Fireworks Night on Friday at 6 p.m., followed by a game on Saturday at 2 p.m and Sunday at 1 p.m... it was McArdle's longest outing since 6.2 innings at Washington State. He lost his weekend rotation slot two weekends ago having given up 11 runs over his last 11.1 innings prior to tonight... Vanegas has given up just two runs over his last 15.1 innings and nine games.