Beavers wins two of three games against No. 3 Stanford, Goss Stadium sold-out.

The No. 3 Oregon State Beavers (38-8-1) won the series against the No. 2 Stanford Cardinal (39-8) at Goss Stadium at Coleman Field, defeating the Cardinal in two out of the three games.

The Beavers won 6-2 on Friday, 10-0 on Saturday and lost 6-9 during Sunday’s finale.

After Saturday’s win, junior outfielder Trevor Larnach was happy about the performance of the team clinching the series win.

“We’ve been rolling lately. Pitching is doing an outstanding job, we’re putting up more runs and hits,” Larnach said. “Just really locked in on both sides.”

When searching for the sweep on Sunday, the Beavers found themselves at a comfortable 5-point lead up to the fourth inning, but let it fade away in the late stages giving Stanford the victory.

“You win the series, you know, you feel good about that,” Pat Casey, OSU head coach, said. “We just didn’t get it done, we didn’t finish. We had every opportunity to win the game.”.

Freshman right-hand pitcher Kevin Abel was first on the mound for the Beavers, making his fifteenth appearance and third start of the season.

The first run of the game for the Beavers came up early in the bottom of the first inning. Junior infielder Cadyn Grenier made an impressive bunt to send him to first and allow junior outfielder Steven Kwan to run home.

This makes 23 games in a row with a hit for Grenier, making this the second longest streak in school history since 1977.

When senior infielder Michael Gretler came up to bat, he hit a sac fly. This allowed Grenier, who was already on third, to sneak home and get another run in for the Beavers.

As the lead stood at 2-0 and the bases loaded at the top of the third, Stanford freshman outfielder Christian Robinson got a run from a walk. With the score now at 2-1, the Beavers looked to widen the gap even more in the bottom of the third.

In the bottom of the fourth, sophomore outfielder Preston Jones ran home after an almost perfect bunt by junior outfielder Steven Kwan, increasing the lead to 5-1. After a walk by sophomore catcher Adley Rutschman, junior catcher/infielder Zak Taylor ran home bringing it to a comfortable 6-1 lead for the Beavers. 

In the top of the fifth, Robinson singled up the middle and gave sophomore infielder/outfielder Andrew Daschbach a run home, bringing the score to 5-2

From the fifth inning on, the Beavers scored no runs and let the Cardinal catch up, leveling the score to 6-6 in the ninth inning. Extra innings were issued and the Cardinal had bases loaded in the top of the tenth.

Sophomore pitcher Will Matthiessen made a huge play at bat when he doubled down the left field line and racked up a triple RBI, turning the tables for Stanford to come out on top with a final score of 6-9.

Throughout the series, the top two teams in the Pac-12 gave it all they had. With an overall total weekend attendance of 11,499, Goss Stadium was electric.

“It’s a lot of fun having them behind us. It’s a big energy boost for everybody,” senior pitcher Luke Heimlich said of Friday’s game. “It’s our job to get the fans involved and make things interesting and we were able to do that and keep the energy up all game.”

With a 6-2 win on Friday and a 10-0 win on Saturday, the Beavers still left with the eighth consecutive series win over the Cardinal.

The Beavers will take on San Diego on Monday at 5:35 p.m. at Goss Stadium. It will be aired on the radio on Beaver Sports Network. Student tickets are available at Goss Stadium two hours before the first pitch. Regular tickets can be purchased at: BeaverTickets.com/Baseball