Written and Audio Stories by Wilder Lewis
The Ducks pulled off the sweep in their final PAC-12 regular season game ever, on Saturday, beating Washington State 10-4, they were able to get the win, on senior day, thanks to big performances from Mason Neville, Maddox Molony and Kevin Seitter.
Oregon came into the game today having beat WSU in both of the first two games of the series by scores of 9-2 and 8-4. On Friday the Ducks were off to a slow start finding themselves down 2-1 after 7. Luckily the damage was nothing substantial thanks to another great outing from Grayson Grinsell who went 6 innings and had 11 strikeouts. Oregon however didn’t buckle and in the 8th, with the help of Walsh and Molony's RBI hits they were able to take the lead 5-4. Lastly, Boettcher would step up and crush a 3-run HR to LF to secure the win for the Ducks who looked to carry that momentum into today's game.
Things today started more or less the same as yesterday for the Ducks as it was a back-and-forth battle of defense. Kevin Seitter was able to get off to a hot start picking up 4 K’s in his first 3 innings. Oregon was also making some great plays to back him up though as catcher Bennett Thompson picked off a steal attempt from second. Then to end the 3rd, Mason Neville would make a Sports Center top 10 worthy play throwing out the runner coming home from RF. Neville wouldn’t be done though as in the bottom of the same inning he would turn the tides by opening the scoring for the Ducks, launching his 3rd Hr in as many games deep over the RF bullpen to give the Ducks an early 2-0 lead.
It didn’t take long for the Cougars to respond though as in the top of the 4th they would get 2 runners on. Then 3 quality at-bats from their six, seven, and eight batters would find 3 straight runs coming across the board giving them the lead 4-3. The WSU lead wouldn’t last long though as in the bottom of the same inning, SS Maddox Molony would launch another deep ball for the Ducks taking on two more runs on 0 outs. Then with bases loaded Neville would send one deep to the warning track advancing all the runners and bringing home one more run giving the Ducks a 5-3 lead before the inning would end.
Oregon then added another 2 big runs in the 5th thanks to a Carter Garate 2 out 2 RBI double extending the lead to 7-3. The Cougs would respond right back though as Alan Shibley launched one deep into center field forcing an end to Kevin Seitter’s day. Oregon would get it right back though as Neville sends another ball out of the park for his 4th HR in three days. Things would quiet down for both teams after this inning as the Cougars wouldn’t score again and the Ducks would only tack on a few more in the 8th after an RBI single from Hellman and some poor pitching from WSU.
Oregon finally pulled off the sweep in conference play giving them a huge boost as they go into the final PAC-12 tournament where they look to go back to back.