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Not Finished Yet

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Box Score

STANFORD, Calif. – No. 4 Stanford forced a deciding final game of the Stanford Regional with a thrilling 8-6 win over Fresno State on Sunday night at Sunken Diamond.

"What a hard fought game this was," said the Clarke and Elizabeth Nelson Director of Baseball David Esquer. "It won't always be clean and pretty, but that's sometimes how it goes when you get to this point in the season. This group battled all day long through two games. Our coaching staff and our student-athletes were up to the challenge that faced them and we'll be ready to do it again on Monday night."

Starting pitcher Erik Miller (W, 8-2) set a career high with 12 strikeouts and Jack Little got the final nine outs for his program-record 27th career save. Tim Tawa reached base four times, finishing 3-for-3 with two runs, Duke Kinamon drove in a pair to finish 2-for-5 and Brandon Wulff also scored twice. With the win, Stanford forces a winner-take-all Game 7 of the Stanford Regional on Monday at 7 p.m. PT on ESPNU. The winner advances to the Super Regional round and will take on Mississippi State in a three-game series in Starkville next week.

Miller started the game with a one-two-three frame, including two strikeouts. In the home half, Kyle Stowers drove the first pitch he saw far enough for a home run to left field by left fielder Jeff Jamison timed his jump perfectly to bring it back and rob the Cardinal. Will Matthiessen delivered with two outs, however, driving the ninth pitch of his at-bat to deep left-centerfield to score Wulff, who had walked and stolen second.

Miller worked a scoreless second, allowing his first hit of the day, a two-out infield single, before striking out Nate Thimjon on a nasty breaking ball in the dirt. Stanford doubled its lead with Christian Robinson's RBI double to score Tawa and make it 2-0, but the damage could have been more as Maverick Handley was robbed of extra bases and two RBI by a leaping catch at the wall by Zach Ashford to end the inning.

Miller struck out the side in the third, upping his total to six. After getting the first two outs, the Bulldogs put runners aboard with a single and a walk but Miller got JT Arruda swinging to end the inning. Stanford tacked on two more in the home half – Kinamon drove a single into right to bring in Matthiessen before Daschbach took home on a wild pitch to push the lead to 4-0.

Stanford rued its opportunities to jump out to a big lead as Fresno State responded with a pair of home runs in the fourth to tie it up at 4-4. McCarthy Tatum led off with a solo homer before Zach Presno's three-run shot tied it. Miller got the final two outs of the inning before Stanford responded with a run in the bottom half.

Kinamon came up huge with a two-out RBI single up the middle to score Wulff, and Miller upped his strikeout total to 10 in the fifth with two more during a shutdown inning. Stanford restored its four-run advantage with a series of walks and singles in the bottom of the fifth – Stowers singled home Tawa, Robinson crossed home on an error by the catcher and Stowers eventually came in on Maverick Handley's RBI single.

In the sixth, Miller struck out his first two batters to give him his new career high but a fielding error and a walk set up Jamison's two-out RBI double and another Cardinal error allowed a second run to cross home, making it 8-6 with both runs being unearned. Zach Grech replaced Miller, freezing Carter Bins on a 2-2 fastball for the final out to strand two baserunners.

Stanford went away quietly in the sixth and Grech returned to work the seventh, allowing a lead-off single to get Jack Little into the game. An unlucky bounce on a tailor-made double-play grounder put runners on the corners with no outs, but Little struck out Nolan Dempsey swinging and Handley threw out the stolen base attempt of McCarthy Tatum before an inning-ending fly ball to erase the threat.

In the eighth, Little plunked the lead-off batter but responded with three consecutive strikeouts to retire the side before Nik Cardinal retired the side in order in the bottom half. Little allowed a lead-off single in the top of the ninth but, thanks to his fourth strikeout and an outstanding play by Daschbach at first for the final out, got the next three batters out to end the contest – it was Little's 11th save of the season.

Cardinal Notes

  • Little stands alone at the top of Stanford's career saves list, passing Steve Chitren (26).
  • Miller crossed the 10-strikeout threshold for the second time in his career – his previous career high was 11 at Oregon on April 20.
  • Handley has thrown out 13-of-31 stolen base attempts against him this season.
  • Stanford out-hit the Bulldogs, 8-6, with both teams making two errors in a wild affair.