Game Recap of No. 11 Oregon’s win over Washington St. Available by Addison Cerezo
EUGENE, Ore. — The 2026 edition of Oregon Baseball already looks different than early-season expectations. The Ducks have gone to rotations at first base, left field, and designated hitter. Maddox Molony, a program staple and former budding national star, now typically hits behind three different freshmen, and Collin Clarke, the longest tenured member of Oregon’s starting staff entering the season, has spent both the Big Ten Tournament and the Eugene Regional as a reliever.
One constant for an Oregon team succeeding on the fly has been sophomore ace Will Sanford. The billing Saturday night had all the hype you could ask for: a sold-out PK Park, Oregon hunting a spot in the regional final on Sunday, and a Washington State opponent who had already played spoiler once on the weekend. In his postseason debut, Sanford tossed the game of his life. A career high in strikeouts and 6 ⅓ scoreless innings was exactly what Oregon needed from the young righty. When Sanford’s evening came to a close, no Oregon pitcher in 2026 had thrown more innings, won more games, or struck out more batters.
“They stepped up,” head coach Mark Wasikowski said of all three Oregon arms used Saturday, as both Tanner Bradley and Devin Bell followed Sanford with zeroes.
Stepping up was exactly what Sanford did all regular season as Oregon’s Friday arm, a taller task for a sophomore in the Big Ten than he’s made it look.
It hasn’t been a straight line for Sanford to a mid-3’s ERA and nearly 120 strikeouts. After the Ducks won in each of Sanford’s first seven outings, some of the command issues that had limited his freshman campaign resurfaced. As conference play wore on, Sanford had to take his lumps as a Division I starter. Against Michigan in early April, he was on the losing end of a run-rule defeat for the Ducks. A month later, against top-ranked UCLA, Sanford wouldn’t see the fourth inning, and Oregon would fall in run-rule fashion again.
Sanford would recover in the month of May with a pair of strong — and pivotal — performances. Six innings with two earned runs against USC was enough for a series-evening win as Oregon fought to host the very regional they play in now. In the Big Ten Tournament semifinal, Sanford threw six scoreless amidst a hostile environment against Nebraska, striking out nine.
Perhaps the ups and downs of a competitive, rotation-leading season began to benefit Sanford in regional play. After Saturday’s start, he emphasized the growth in his mentality, through work with Oregon’s new brain trust in pitching development, as a new asset this season.
“Working with Flo has been huge,” Sanford said of pitching coach Matt Florer.
The stats back it up: in his first season working with Florer, Sanford has gone from an impressive 9.9 strikeouts per nine innings as a freshman to a dominant 12.6 as a sophomore.
Pitching dominated the day between the Ducks and Cougars, with the first hit of the ballgame for both sides not coming until the fifth inning. Oregon led 1-0 later in the fifth, but with Ollie Obenour at second representing the tying run, Sanford drew the Cougar’s nine hitter in Kyler Northrop. He blew Northrop away and lingered for a moment on the mound. Sanford spread both arms and stared skyward, taking it all in for a moment. It seemed like a young ace embracing the national spotlight, finally announcing himself in full at a level where he’s been forced to earn everything.
After exiting the sixth inning at the doorstep of 100 pitches, Sanford said that Florer approached him in Oregon’s dugout about re-taking the mound to begin the seventh.
“I said ‘of course,’” Sanford stated.
With their ace ready for the moment, the rest of the Ducks followed suit.