Oregon baseball was not phased by Tuesday’s demoralizing walk-off loss to Portland.
The Ducks continued their road trip against Cal on Friday, opening the series with a gritty 5-4 victory at Stu Gordon Stadium. Their ace Jace Stoffal wasn’t at his most dominant, but home runs from Colby Shade and Tanner Smith helped Oregon do just enough to pull out the win.
Stoffal’s streak of 22 2/3 innings without allowing an earned run came to an end on Nathan Manning’s RBI double in the second inning. Manning just missed a home run, and Oregon left fielder Smith just missed making a spectacular catch.
The Ducks responded with a pair of runs against starter Christian Becerra. Shade tied the game with a triple into the right field corner that drove in Rikuu Nishida. Drew Cowley then came through with a two-out single to put Oregon on top, 2-1.
Smith tacked on another in the fourth inning with his seventh home run of the season. It was also the 27th of his career, tying him for the second-most in Oregon history. Also in the fourth, freshman Drew Smith collected his second career hit in his first college start.
Although Stoffal’s command wasn’t quite as sharp as in his previous outings, he managed to settle in. He walked one in each of the third and fourth innings, but kept both of them off the board. He struck out two batters in the fourth — including Kade Kretzschmar, who came in with 16 hits in his last five games.
Shade did damage once again in the fifth inning, blasting a no-doubter to make it a 4-1 Oregon lead. In his first two at-bats, he achieved the two hardest parts of the cycle.
Stoffal threw a perfect fifth inning. In the sixth, he issued his third walk of the evening but stranded the runner once again. He retired Kretzschmar for the third time, ending the hot-hitting outfielder’s streak of multi-hit games.
With six solid innings in the books for Stoffal, the Bears came out swinging in the seventh. Manning hit his second RBI double of the game and advanced to third on a misplay by Nishida. Dom Souto then poked one through the left side, cutting Oregon’s lead to 4-3 with still nobody out in the inning.
Pitching coach Jake Angier made a visit to the mound, but it didn’t help. Max Handron lined an RBI single, tying the game at four apiece. That ended Stoffal’s outing; he kept the Bears under control for six innings but got hit around in the seventh.
Matt Dallas induced an inning-ending double play to stop the damage there.
Cowley singled with one out in the eighth, and Sabin Ceballos walked to give Oregon a prime chance to take the lead. T. Smith struck out, and Jacob Walsh hit a ground ball to short. But shortstop Carson Crawford’s throw was too high, allowing Cowley to score as Walsh was safe by a hair. A brief replay review confirmed the call, and the Ducks retook the lead, 5-4.
Freshman left-hander Grayson Grinsell came in for the eighth to face Cal’s No. 3 and 4 hitters. Grinsell walked Rodney Green Jr., then got Kretzschmar to hit a long flyout to left. After that, Oregon went to closer Josh Mollerus for a five-out save, with the fifth-year senior looking to bounce back after his first rough outing of the year on Tuesday.
Mollerus threw six consecutive balls at one point, but ended the inning on a hard groundout to hold the one-run lead.
He found his form, reverting back to the Mollerus that Oregon fans have gotten to trust over the course of the season. He struck out the side in a scoreless ninth inning, as he put the finishing touches on a big conference win for the Ducks.
Oregon (25-11, 10-6 Pac-12) will look to clinch the series against Cal (17-17, 5-14 Pac-12) Saturday at 2 p.m.
