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UNLV (36-24, 20-1 in the Mt. West) at #1 Oregon St. (43-13, 23-7 in the PAC-12) Goss Stadium / 8:00 PM PDT / ESPN3 / KEJO 1240 AM / KPOJ 620 AM
Oregon St. and UNLV meet this afternoon, in an elimination game, which will end one of the teams' season, and earn the other another shot at UC-Irvine, who blew both the Rebels and the Beavers out during the first two days of the Corvallis Regional.
The winner will need to beat the Anteaters this evening, in a game at 8 PM, in order to earn yet another game with UC-Irvine tomorrow evening at the same time, which they would also have to prevail in in order to advance to the Super Regional round next weekend.
The Rebels, the second seed in Corvallis, and the 3rd place team from the Mt. West, are making their first appearance in the NCAA Tournament since 2005, and bounced back from getting overhauled by UC-Irvine 10-3, after having taken an early 2-0 lead, in the first game of the weekend Friday afternoon at Goss, with a 2-1 win in Saturday afternoon's elimination game that sent North Dakota St. home.
UNLV scored twice in the top of the first inning, the product of a single, a stolen base, a pair of sacrifices, and then a solo home run by Morgan Stotts.
The Bison answered with a single run in the bottom of the first, capitalizing on a leadoff double with another hit and a sacrifice, but that was it for scoring, as 8 empty frames ensued, and the Rebels moved on.
The Beavers suffered their worst defeat in some time, as a game that was scoreless into the bottom of the 4th inning erupted into an Anteater scoring exhibition with a 3 run 5th inning, and especially an 8 run 8th, after Oregon St. had put the tie-ing run at the plate, only to leave the bases loaded in the top half of the inning.
Oregon St. will turn to senior LHP first team All-American Ben Wetzler (11-1, 0.76 ERA) as they have so often when they are up against it for the first game starting assignment today.
The Rebels did not decide on who to start prior to pre-game warmps, and then decided on RHP Kenny Oakley (4-7, 3.35 ERA).
The Beavers lost a coin flip, and despite being the higher seed and having played an equal number of games as the visitor as the Rebels, will once again be the visiting team in their own ballpark today.
Andy_Wooldridge@yahoo.com