Oregon has proved it’s a force to be reckoned with.
The Ducks completed a sweep of Utah Sunday, putting up another strong offensive day to win 7-2. Oregon still hasn’t figured out its starting pitching rotation, but the hitters have done their best to make sure any troubles on the mound don’t matter. It gave the Ducks their fifth win in six conference games so far this season.
The biggest problem for this otherwise great Oregon team has been walks. The Ducks walked only two in their win Saturday, but Caleb Sloan walked three consecutive batters in the first inning to begin Sunday’s matchup.
He miraculously escaped without any runs on the board, inducing a routine double play ball.
The second inning was almost as ugly. He started by giving up a hard liner on a 2-0 count that was caught by Anthony Hall. A single and a hit batter then put two more runners on, but he worked out of it again with a ground ball and a strikeout.
The Ducks struck first, taking a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the second. Josh Kasevich and Hall led off with hits, and Josiah Cromwick drove in a run with a soft groundout. Gavin Grant added another with a two-out RBI single.
Sloan got into another jam in the third, and this time wasn’t quite so fortunate. With runners on the corners and one out, he recorded a clutch strikeout but then allowed a bloop run-scoring single. He limited the damage there, holding onto Oregon’s 2-1 lead.
Sloan got off to a good start in the fourth, retiring the first two batters. But his control issues returned, walking two in a row and hitting a batter to load the bases. That brought an end to his day after 80 pitches — much more than he usually throws.
“Caleb’s learning how to be a starting pitcher,” Oregon coach Mark Wasikowski said. “He’s always been a relief guy… I thought he gave everything he had out there.”
Logan Mercado entered and walked the first batter, bringing in the tying run. Oregon’s control issues have been absolutely brutal this season.
The offense took over from there. Hall instantly gave the Ducks the lead back, leading off the bottom of the fourth with a homer. The similarly hot Tanner Smith followed him up in the same inning with a two-run homer, extending Oregon’s lead to 5-2.
“No panic, no pressure, just a lot of smiles and having fun,” Smith said of the attitude in the dugout. “I think that carried into us as a team.”
Hall continued his surge with a two-out RBI single in the fifth. He and Smith have exploded after slow starts to the season.
Colby Shade led off the bottom of the seventh with a single, and a pair of Utah errors helped him come around to score, making it 7-2.
Stone Churby, Christian Ciuffetelli, Rio Britton and Matt Dallas each pitched a scoreless inning in relief for Oregon. The Ducks’ bullpen has been more reliable than their rotation as of late.
“Tremendous work by Coach [Jake] Angier in game planning,” Wasikowski said. “And those guys pitched exceptionally well. Credit to him and his preparation on the series.”
Dallas ended the game by inducing a double play, completing the 7-2 victory. Oregon is now 5-1 in Pac-12 play, having beaten Stanford and now swept Utah.
“It’s never easy to win a Pac-12 series or sweep a Pac-12 series, and for us to be able to do that was tremendous,” Wasikowski said. “
The Ducks (13-6) will now go on a quick road trip for one game against Gonzaga (13-4) on Tuesday at 3 p.m. They’ll then come back to Eugene for three games against USC (12-5) this weekend.
