It was a long day of baseball for the players, coaches, and fans, but it was an enjoyable day as the Beavers came out with two victories, and more importantly, a series win in their first conference series of the year.
The Beavers ran away with the first game of the day, but it wasn't that easy in Game 2. The second game of the day wound up being a classic pitchers dual between Oregon State freshman right-hander James Nygren and Washington junior right-hander Jorden Merry. Here are some brief notes before I call it a day:
Offense: There wasn't much offense on either side, as like I said earlier, this was truly a pitcher's duel. There were only ten hits total in the game, four by Washington and six by Oregon State, one of those being Chris Hopkins' game winner. Chris had two hits on the night, as did John Wallace. Daniel Robertson and Drew George each had a hit as well, but other than that, nobody could touch starter Jorden Merry. Four of the OSU hits came against Merry in his nine innings of work, and two of the hits came against reliever Elliot Cribby in his .1 innings of work. The two hits that Cribby gave up were the important ones.... that just goes to show what kind of a game Merry was able to put together.
Pitching:Washington's Jorden Merry was brilliant like I just said, but OSU's James Nygren was equally impressive. It was a great outing for the freshman from Henley High School, who threw eight innings and only allowed four hits, striking out six. The relievers contributed in a big way as well, as Keitzman and Grbavac finished off the Huskies. Ketizman only faced one batter and struck him out, so that counts as a productive performance. Grbavac faced five batters, walked one, struck out one, and retired the rest to seal the victory. The Huskies still haven't seen closer Mark Grbavac... maybe we'll break him out tomorrow.
Defense: The only error of the night came on a interesting play in the fourth inning right as the rain began to fall heavily and the players began to throw the ball all over the diamond. With a Husky on first, Nygren threw a wild pitch. Ortiz got to the ball quick enough for the runner to freeze near third base, but Ortiz didn't realize this. He threw the ball towards home thinking there was going to be a play at the plate when there was none at all. He overthrew Nygren, allowing the runner to score from third. That was the only Husky run of the game. It was a freebie, but the one run the Beavers scored in the first nine innings was also a freebie, so we considered that run karma and rolled with it.
I'm tired.
Remember tomorrow's game will be televised live at 2:00 on FSN. See ya'll then.
GO BEAVERS!
JB. Out.