Oregon Sweeps Civil War, Bruins Back Into Pac-10 Championship

But the team wide slump, where hitting was not only soft, but untimely, and defensive lapses didn’t help what was at times less than the spectacular pitching that Oregon St. had had much of the year, has lasted, and worsened, for a couple of weeks. Throughout the season, the Beavers had suffered the same kind of play that punctuated their late game skid, but it rarely lasted more than a game or two.

Whether they can find the magic that made them one of the country’s best teams much of the season again is sure to keep a lot of Beaver players, coaches, and fans awake at night this week.

Of course I don’t know but it just seems to me the magic they once had went away when Susac and Rodriguez came back into the line up. As a team, and as individuals, their high level focus has seemed to have gone away with those two back in the line up. Not saying that either Andrew or Jake have ruined the team by any stretch (if it is at all true what I’m saying it is not their problem but all the other players’ and the coaching staff’s problem), but at the same time I just wonder if the team lost some of that chemistry they had in that they said “hey we were this good without those two, now we can be great because Andrew and Jake will really pick us up.” Thus leading to the team as a whole letting down its focus a notch or two.

I hesitated saying anything about this but with how inexperienced this team is and with how we have seen them go into games that very much looked like they just expected to win them without actually executing to win the game I just now feel stronger about it all.

Again in no way this is a knock on those two guys for I actually think if let’s say it was earlier in the season they came back the team would have found its “second” identity in time for the season end and it mostly has a feeling of bad timing overall.

I guess in general did this team get too over-confident and let down its overall focus once those two came back?

Thoughts?

the Huskies rally from 6 runs down to steal a soggy win that would prove to cost the Beavers the conference championship

There is an mental/emotional quality to this loss that should not be overlooked yes, but technically and overall this is what cost the team the championship:

Oregon St. lost their last 5 games, and 6 of their last 7.

Should have been able to bounce back from that UW loss without much problem, which they seemed to have done with the win over SC, but again I just think this connects to my above thoughts.

There’s no point in trying to guess what’s gone wrong, because we’ll never know. What we do know is that come tomorrow morning, the teams that draw the Corvallis regional will be throwing a party.

not just with one or two teams, all up and down the conference, great players, great coaches and on any given day………..and its not just baseball. We’re going to be earning all those big bucks the Larry Holmes Scott has gotten for us and that Have-Baked Whats-his-name sold us cheap, we’re now in a place to realize how good we are. fSEC.