I'm heading out for a few hours, but if you're taking a break from spending some time with mom, here's the place to chat about today's rubber game with UCLA. Mike Stutes manhandled the Bruins in Game 1, then the Beavers couldn't get it together in Game 2. Now it's up to Jorge Reyes to try and earn the series win for the Beavers.

GO BEAVERS!

--JB--

Instead of typing my thoughts from todays game, we're trying out a mobile post system instead. Here's my report from the game:

GO BEAVERS!

I'm off to Corvallis today to watch the game in person, but if you'll be listening on the radio or on Beaver Nation Online, here's the place to chat about the game. With a huge 10-1 victory last night, the Beavers are looking to win the series today with freshmen Tanner Robles on the hill.

I'll be back later tonight with a mobile post and hopefully some pictures from the game.

GO BEAVERS!

--JB--

It's great to see Mike have a performance like this just three weekends away from the post-season. He had an outing like this back at Arizona State, but he's had a couple of rough outings since then. With the win, and the nine strikeouts, he moves into second all time on the Oregon State all time strikeout list. And just for fun, we'll post his K's after the list.

The All-time leaders on the career strikeouts list:

GO BEAVERS!

--JB--

First off, it feels great to notch up the first win of the series against a very talented UCLA team. Second, it feels great to know that Mike Stutes had an exceptional complete game outing. Third, you gotta like the fact the Beavers put ten runs on the board.

Like I said, Stutes was brilliant on the hill, throwing the first complete game of the season and the first of his Oregon State career. Stutes only gave up one run in his nine innings of work, allowing four hits and striking out nine, He walked three and threw 134 pitches. 

Erik Ammon and Chris Hopkins were the only two Beavers with multi-hit games. They were both 2-for-3 on the game. Ammon has three RBI's on the night, two of those coming on a two out single to center in the bottom of the fourth inning. He also drove in Oregon State's final run of the game. Hopkins scored two runs on the game.

Daniel Robertson was 1-for-5 with a run scored and two RBI's. Ryan Ortiz was 1-for-4, as was Lonnie Lechelt and Jason Ogata. Garret Nash was 1-for-3, and Joey Wong was the only Beaver starter not to record a hit. 

With the win, the Beavers move to 23-18 overall and 10-9 in the Pac-10. 12-9 sounds so much better... let's get it done!

GO BEAVERS!

--JB--

The Beavers and Bruins met up at the end of last season with the Beavers needing a series sweep to put themselves in post-season consideration. They got the sweep, and you know the rest.

The Beavers have similar circumstances this year, although they aren't in desperation mode yet. The Beavers need the series win to boost their RPI, their record, their ranking, and their confidence. 

Mike Stutes (2-6, 6.09) will get the start today for the Beavers. He desperately needs a good performance, as he's been subpar at best so far this season. All the stats you could ever want are here.

Game time is 5:00 p.m. 

GO BEAVERS!

--JB--

The NCAA's dreaded Acedemic Progress Report was released two days ago, which means some teams are trying to find ways to handle the loss of scholarships and other penalties. If you're interested in seeing the full list of violators, here's the place for you.

Oregon State doesn't have that problem, as they squeaked through the APR with no penalties. The baseball and football teams both showed improvement from a year ago, but men's basketball plummeted 12 points.

The APR covers the 2003-2007 acedemic years. How it works is that each athlete receives one point for staying academically eligible and one point for staying in school. Each team adds up its athletes' points and divides them by the total points possible to get an APR score. For ease of reading, decimal points are dropped.

Schools must score 925 or better to avoid NCAA sanctions. Division I men's basketball and football averages, respectively, are 928 and 934.

Oregon State
Baseball: 932, +8
Men's basketball: 935, -12
Football: 926, +13
Women's basketball: 948, +8
Best score: 1,000 (women's cross country, women's outdoor track)

So this brings up an interesting topic. Does performance correlate to acedemic performance? The basketball went through a coaching change, an 0-18 Pac-10 season, the worst in Pac-10 history, and emerges 12 points lower in the APR. They're still higher than some teams in the country, but that drop is somewhat alarming.

On the other hand, the baseball team and football teams have each had successful seasons, not only this year, but the three years prior. Their academic performances remains above the bar.

Even if the Beaver basketball team doesn't improve on the court this year, we can assure that Craig Robinson will hold a high standard for his players in the classroom. As an Ivy League player and coach as well as a businessman, he knows how important that education is.

And finally, here's a look at the Pac-10 football and basketball programs:

Arizona 
Men's basketball: 933, +9 
Football: 902, +19 

Arizona State 
Men's basketball: 905, +20 
Football: 933, +7 

California 
Men's basketball: 942, +7 
Football: 967, +2 

Oregon 
Men's basketball: 975, +1 
Football: 921, +9 

Oregon State 
Men's basketball: 935, -12 
Football: 926, +13 

Stanford 
Men's basketball: 954, -1 
Football: 986, +2 

UCLA 
Men's basketball: 968, +3 
Football: 941, +10 

USC
Men's basketball: 863, -19
Football: 948, +1 

Washington
Men's basketball: 943, +8
Football: 948, +6

Washington State
Men's basketball: 905, +13
Football: 916, -14

GO BEAVERS!

--JB--

First off, the "pending" game has finally ended. The Beavers record is now completely up to date. For those of you wondering, it's 22-18. 

Today, the game started 4-0 in the bottom of the fourth. The Beavers emerged victorious 4-1. While a win is a win, it's somewhat not a good sign that the Beavers couldn't score a run in five innings. And how weird must it feel to not score a run on a given day but still win. The linescore:

Correction: The Beavers were leading 3-0 heading into the bottom of the fourth, which means they did score a run on Wednesday, Jordan Lennerton's solo home run in the fifth. Complete oversight on my part. Thanks to Konce for sending that in.

James Nygren continued where he left off on April 15, logging a total of 7 innings, giving up one run on three hits. He walked one and struck out four.

Kraig Sitton and Taylor Starr combined to complete the eighth inning, then Rhoderick took over in the ninth. Kevin recorded his tenth save of the year, forcing a popup and striking out two.

Jason Ogata was the only Beaver with a multi-hit game, and he had both of those hits before the day even started. Robertson, Wong, Wallace, George, Lennerton, and Nash each had a hit a piece.

The Beavers still have twelve games remaining on their schedule, the first of those coming Friday against UCLA at Goss Stadium. The Beavers need to win all of their six remaining Pac-10 games to improve their playoff stock and get the ball rolling in the right directions as the playoffs approach.

GO BEAVERS!

--JB--

After the original rain postponement and several re-schedulings, the Beavers and Pilots plan to get together today at 4pm at Goss Stadium at Coleman Field to resume the game that started April 15.

The Beavers hold a 3-0 lead entering the bottom of the fourth. James Nygren is the pitcher of record so far in the game, having thrown three scoreless innings. Jason Ogata already has two hits and a RBI, and Daniel Robertson also drove in a run. 

This might be a good game to test out the golf bag theory. We've already got three innings behind us, now we just need to finish out the last six. The "starter" is still to be determined, by my guess is the coaches will throw a younger guy like Josh Keller, Josh Osich, Sitton, Starr, or maybe even go back to Nygren. Hard to tell at this point.

Once again, the game resumes at 4:00 p.m. If you'll be listening to the game on the radio, chime in here with comments. If you'd rather go enjoy the game in person, I should remind you that admission is free.

GO BEAVERS!

--JB--