After taking the first five games of its two-week swing against West Coast Conference teams, Oregon baseball took the field for game three against Loyola Marymount, looking to secure its second series sweep of 2019.
Despite the bullpen’s fourth blown save of the season, Oregon was victorious with a two-run seventh inning, which set the table for Nico Tellache’s second save on the weekend.
“I think we responded really well,” Tellache said. “They put up a number, we put one right back and then a shutdown inning. I think we did a good job of not crumbling and getting after it.”
Following Brett Walker’s blown save in the seventh, Tellache pitched two scoreless innings of relief to not only follow up his 1.1 inning save on Friday, but to secure the 7-6 win and sweep over LMU.
“Nico was certainly our hottest reliever this weekend,” head coach George Horton said. “I know he wants to be that guy that we call ‘the stopper.’”
Although not great like Friday and Saturday, Oregon pitched well enough to win Sunday’s game.
In the first two games of the series, Oregon starting pitchers Cullen Kafka and Cole Stringer combined for 11.1 innings, one earned run and 10 strikeouts.
Sunday’s starter Ryne Nelson was not as strong, surrendering four runs over six innings with eight strikeouts and six groundouts. He did, however, leave with the lead.
“They did a nice job against our pitching today,” Horton said. “Instead of us self destructing, we threw the ball over the plate and [LMU] did a good job. We’re never gonna question our guys when they throw the ball over the plate instead of walking or hitting guys.”
Trailing 6-5, Oregon’s top of the order orchestrated a two-run inning to record the final lead change of the game.
A Sam Novitske walk and a Johnny DeLuca single set the table for shortstop Spencer Steer’s game-tying RBI single.
“I was just looking for a ball over the plate,” Steer said. “You know, trying to keep it simple, not trying to do too much, and trying to get a base hit.”
After DeLuca was erased on a fielder’s choice hit by Gabe Matthews, Jakob Goldfarb stepped to the plate looking to knock in the go-ahead run. He wouldn’t get that chance though, as LMU reliever Matt Voelker balked, allowing DeLuca to trot home for the eventual game-winning run.
Oregon’s first runs of the game came in the first on a two-run home run by Matthews. Freshman left fielder Tanner Smith had a two-out RBI single in the second and in the fourth to raise his batting average to .387. He later scored in the fourth on a Novitske single.
“We have a bunch of confidence in our lineup,” Steer said. “We know one through nine, we’ve got really good hitters up-and-down the order.”
Oregon will have a one-game stop in Portland on Tuesday to take on the Pilots before heading to Hawaii for a four-game series starting Thursday.
“Portland’s been tough on us and we’ll start with that,” Horton said. “Hawaii’s been a challenge on us back when we used to go there all the time. It’s always difficult to win there.”
Follow Maverick Pallack on Twitter@mavpallack
