Baseball Recap: #6 Oregon Ducks @ #7 Oregon State Beavers

Your #6 Oregon Ducks traveled up the road to Corvallis to take on the #7 Oregon State Beavers for the 4th time in 5 days on Tuesday night, looking to keep the momentum going after a 3-game sweep over the weekend. The big first baseman Jacob Walsh would kick things off for Oregon with two outs in the top of the first, connecting on a solo home run to center field, and giving the Ducks a quick 1-0 lead. But the Beavs would strike back with a solo home run of their own in the bottom of the first and then take advantage of some sloppy play by the Ducks in the 2nd inning, plating a pair of runs to give them a 3-1 lead after two.

The Ducks would get another run back in the 3rd inning, a Ryan Cooney solo shot to center, but the Beavers would get it right back in the 4th, scoring a run on a balk, extending their lead 4-2. But that’s where things would start to get interesting for the Ducks, as they would plate three runs in the 6th (one on a Jeffery Heard hit fielder’s choice, and two more on a base hit by Cooney), and two more in the 7th inning (a Walsh double and a Drew Smith single), giving Oregon a 7-4 lead late in the game. The Ducks would add on another insurance run in the 9th on a Walsh grounder to 3rd base, sealing the game for an 8-4 Oregon win.

What a wild couple of weeks, eh? These Ducks have proven that they can hang with the best of the best, but they also are capable of playing down to lesser opponents. It’s all about consistency at this point in the season. With just 11 games left in the regular season, they can’t afford to drop many games if they want a good seed in the Big Ten tournament. But if they play like they have the last four games… there’s not a single team in the country they can’t compete with.

As always, ‘Sco Ducks