Madrigal leads Beavers to victory, gets four runs and three hits.

Heading into the Corvallis Regional, No. 3 seed Oregon State University faced Northwestern State University (37-23). It marks the first postseason game for the Beavers (45-10-1), and with a final score of 9-3, they performed well both on defense and on offense.

As the Demons came up to bat against the Beavers each inning, junior pitcher Bryce Fehmel didn’t let them get too far, only allowing six hits with three runs and four strikeouts.

“Early on I was getting ahead of them for the most part. When I was able to do that, I was able to throw almost every pitch in any count, and that was able to keep them off-balance,” Fehmel said.

After some slow previous at-bats, junior infielder Nick Madrigal showed why he was the 2017 Pac-12 Player of the Year, racking up four runs in three hits for the Beavers throughout the game.

In the third inning, Madrigal’s first hit got him a two-run single with bases loaded to bring the score to 2-0.

Later in the game with bases loaded in the sixth, Madrigal capped off a four-run rally with another two-run single, widening the lead to 8-1 for the Beavers.

As a junior, Madrigal has a total of 205 hits throughout his career, which ranks him eighth in the nation.

Recently being named Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year, junior infielder Cayden Grenier made a huge play in the fifth inning, proving why he was awarded the honor.

As the ball came flying off a hit from the Demons, Grenier went deep in the hole and threw across his body to second to Madrigal to complete a double play.

“Not too many guys in the country get to that ball and he made it look pretty easy. That’s why he’s deserving of the defensive player of the year award,” Madrigal said.

After the game, Beavers head coach Pat Casey was impressed with how his team performed.

“I thought Bryce was outstanding, got a big hit out of Nobach to get us going, Nick drove in four runs,” Casey said. “I believe offensively we need to be a little bit better but I thought we did the things we needed to do.”

Casey later confirmed that senior pitcher Luke Heimlich will be starting in the game against LSU on Saturday for a winners’ bracket game at 7 p.m.

All games air on the Beaver Sports Network and will be broadcasted on ESPNU.