Recap: Oregon State Baseball Unable To Hold off Cal State Fullerton In Series Opener

Oregon State had a few too many mistakes pile up Friday night in a 5-3 defeat at the hands of the Cal State Fullerton Titans. Despite outhitting CSUF 8-6, Oregon State’s three errors (compared to Fullerton’s zero) hurt them enough to get them in the loss column.

Fullerton struck first when catcher Daniel Cope blasted a solo home run over the right-field wall in the top of the second inning.

In the bottom of the third, Cadyn Grenier and Trevor Larnach continued their hot streaks when Grenier doubled and Larnach did the same shortly after, allowing Grenier to score with two down.

The fifth inning would prove to be a rough one for the Beavers. A pitch from Luke Heimlich got away from Adley Rutschman, allowing Fullerton first baseman Jake Pavletich to score from third base. In that same inning, left fielder Chirs Prescott would score an unearned run for the Titans.

Adley Rutschman began a Beavs’ comeback in the bottom of the sixth with a solo home run down the right-field line.

Oregon State tied it up in the bottom of the seventh with an Andy Armstrong double that scored Zak Taylor from first base. Fullerton retook the lead with an RBI single by shortstop Sahid Valenzuela. Rightfielder Ruban Cardenas followed it up with an RBI single of his own that scored Valenzuela to make it 5-3.

No more runs would be scored that day and the Beavers would fall to CSUF in the first game of the series.

Luke Heimlich was the starting pitcher for Oregon State and by most standards, had himself a pretty commendable night. It was the few mistakes he did make, however, that ended up costing the Beavers in a big way. The wild pitch in the fifth along with the home run ball in the second created a hole that set the loss in motion. Heimlich pitched a full six innings giving up three runs (one earned) with three hits, two walks, and an impressive nine strikeouts.

Kevin Abel came on in relief in the seventh briefly facing just two batters, walking one and striking out one. Brandon Eisert followed Abel with 2.1 innings in which he gave up 2 hits, a walk, and an earned run with a strikeout. Eisert would be “awarded” the loss to make him 2-1 in 2018. Jake Mulholland pitched against the last two batters striking out one while allowing a strikeout.

The Titans are now 4-9 this season heading into game two which will begin on Saturday at 1 PM. You can catch that game and the rest of this series televised on the Pac-12 Networks.