Davis And Moore Dominate Stanford

Final Score: Oregon St. 10 Stanford 4

Oregon St.'s Dylan Davis continued to destroy Stanford pitching, with 3 more hits that drove in 5 more runs Saturday, as the 6th ranked Beavers belted #25 Stanford 10-4 to ensure their 3rd consecutive series win, 3rd series win in a row over the Cardinal, and 5th consecutive series win at Sunken Diamond Saturday.

Davis' double down the left field line provided the middle 2 runs of the Oregon St. 4 run 4th inning that opened a 4-0 lead, and another single that scored Max Gordon in the 6th inning opened up an 8-0 lead for the Beavers.

Another 2 RBI single by Davis in the 8th reopened an 8 run lead, negating the effects of Austin Wilson's 2 run home run for Stanford in the bottom of the 6th inning, which snapped a stretch of 23 scoreless innings by Moore. Davis has 8 RBIs in the 2 games against Stanford.

Meanwhile, freshman Andrew Moore had to work through various dramas, but allowed only 4 hits besides Brian Ragira's single that preceded Wilson's homer run in 6 innings. And with help mostly from Brandon Jackson who worked 2+ innings out of the bullpen, Moore improved to 10-1 for the season.

Stanford starter John Hochstatter didn't survive the Oregon St. 4th, and took the loss that dropped him to 3-3 for the year.

Andy Peterson was the other primary problem for Stanford, hammering out 3 hits as well as drawing a walk, and all that produced 2 RBIs, and Peterson went on to score twice as well.

Things got a bit ragged late in the game, as Stanford pinch hitter Brett Michael homered to end Jackson's afternoon, and a wild pitch contributed to another Cardinal run, as Tyler Painton and Taylor Starr closed out the game for Oregon St., who took over sole possession of first place in the Pac-12 with the win.

Overall, Oregon St. was in control most of the way, and were seemingly unfazed even by Michael Conforto lining into a triple play in the first inning, and the ejection of Jake Rodriguez in the 7th inning, for using the wrong terminology when disputing balls and strikes.

The win, which was the 11th in a row by the Beavers, accomplished a couple of major milestones besides the various series stats, as the team improved to 40-8 for the year, becoming only the second Oregon St. team along with the 2005 squad that went 41-9 to reach the 40 win plateau in the regular season.

The Beavers also improved to 19-4 in the Pac-12, taking sole possession of first place in the conference. The 19 wins also matches the 2005 team for most wins in conference since the unification of the North and Sough in 1999. 3 more win in the 7 remaining conference games will equal the 1994 team's 22 wins in the Pac-12 North for most conference wins in a season.

Oregon St. will go for that mark tomorrow at 1 PM in the final game of the series.

The loss left Stanford at 26-19 for the year, and dropped the Cardinal below .500 in the Pac-12 race, as they slipped to 11-12 in conference.

Andy_Wooldridge@yahoo.com