EUGENE, Ore – A night after the Ducks could push across just one run in regulation, Oregon baseball (17-7, 6-3 Pac-12) seemed to have an easier win in the bag. Through two innings, Oregon was cruising. The Ducks led 4-0 and had their top-of-the-rotation starter RJ Gordon seemed to have his A-game on.
But the script flipped for Oregon. The team which has had such a hard time starting games, but had the middle third of the game be a breeze, would struggle in the middle as the Seattle Redhawks (7-18, 3-6 WAC) continued to fight back.
However, as it has all year, Oregon would ride its bullpen depth. Ian Umlandt, Cole Stokes, Brock Moore and Colin Clarke gave Oregon four innings of one run baseball. Most importantly, the true freshman Stokes and Clarke inherited difficult situations and rewarded the coaching staff with double play balls.
Oregon secured at the very least a series split against the Redhawks, winning 10-2.
Gordon was coming off one of the better Pac-12 starts of his career and had similar success early on. His fastball, though a few ticks lower than usual, still sat in the low 90’s, and his curveball featured consistent dive that got multiple hitters fishing. Through three innings, Gordon had struck out three batters and stranded four on the basepaths.
And the Ducks offense would match that hot start. Atop the lineup, Bryce Boettcher would reach on an error, Chase Meggers would single him to second and Jacob Walsh would walk to load the bases. Foreshadowing the rest of his evening, Jeffrey Heard singled home two runs. Mason Neville added another on a single of his own.
In the second, the Ducks would continue their death-by-a-million-papercuts approach. In Maddox Moloney’s third start, the local product led off the inning with a single, was moved to second on a Boettcher bunt and to third on a Meggers groundout. Yet again, Jeffrey Heard knocked him in, already with three RBI through two innings.
That’s where the game would begin to turn. For the Redhawks, Sam Kane would turn on a 2-0 fastball and hit it into the away team bullpen. The teams traded zeros for three frames before the Ducks added one in the sixth.
Inserted for Gordon in the top of the sixth, Umlandt made easy work in his first inning. But in the seventh, two walks and a single sandwiched a strikeout. Oregon made the call to Stokes, who had only 4.2 innings coming into the game. After walking his first hitter, Stokes induced a 4-6-3 double play to keep the Ducks ahead by four.
That would be mirrored in the eighth. Moore entered, presumably to finish the game. Moore allowed a leadoff double and struck out a batter, but as he walked Kellen Carr, Moore would grip his right elbow and call the coaching staff. Clarke, with just 12 innings and 10 earned runs on the season, would watch a 2-2 fastball get grounded right into the glove of Carter Garate, who turned a slick 5-4-3 double play.
Oregon would add three more in the eighth on a home run by Mason Neville, his fourth of the year, and Clarke would close it out with relative ease in the ninth.
Injuries to Moore and Justin Cassella, who was removed from the game after legging out an infield single, as well as a scare to Garate, would cloud what ended up being a convincing win. Oregon will look to take the series tomorrow with first pitch at 5:05.