Oregon St. Starts Home Stand Against USC

USC (16-23, 8-10) at #7 Oregon St. (31-8, 11-4) / 4:05 PM / Goss Stadium / KEJO 1240 AM & KPOJ 620 AM

Game Notes / Gametracker / Live Stream

Oregon St. returns home to start a 6 game home stand, beginning with this weekend's Pac-12 series against USC, who has won the season series the last 2 years.

Today's game was moved up from its original 5:35 first pitch to a 4:05 start to reduce the conflict with the football Spring Scrimmage, which is being broadcast on the Pac-12 Network, and starts at 7 PM a couple blocks from Goss in Reser Stadium.

The Trojans are starting the second half of an 8 game road trip. USC won the last 2 games of their conference series in Salt Lake City last weekend, taking 7-4 and 15-10 wins over Utah in slugfests, and have won 3 of their last 4 games. Entering the Oregon St. series, 7 Trojans are hitting .300 or better.

The Beavers won 3 of 5 games on their recent northern road trip, capping the venture with a 4-3 14 inning win over Seattle Monday. But losing both games of last Saturday's double header to Washington produced the first Pac-12 series loss of the season for Oregon St.

Oregon St. will start off the game and the weekend with senior LHP Matt Boyd (7-2, 1.81) on the mound. Boyd suffered only the 3rd loss of his career in the first game against the Huskies last Saturday, giving up 9 hits, and being charged with 4 runs in 6+ innings in the 5-1 loss, after having shut out Washington over the first 5 innings.

USC will counter with the return of junior LHP Bob Wheatley (3-2, 1.51) to the series opening slot in the Trojans' rotation. Wheatley was the Friday night starter for the Trojans until the job was handed over to junior LHP Sean Silva (1-2, 4.05) for the last 3 series.

Today's lineup for the Beavers:

Tyler Smith-SS

Andy Peterson-2B

Michael Conforto-LF

Dylan Davis-RF

Ryan Barnes-DH

Danny Hayes-1B

Jake Rodriguez-C

Kavin Keyes-3B

Max Gordon-CF

Andy_Wooldridge@yahoo.com