Oregon baseball (12-9, 2-4 Pac-12) was less than 24 hours removed from handing No. 20 Arizona State (22-1, 5-1 Pac-12) its first loss of the season, and the Ducks were searching for the series win.
The Ducks trailed 2-0 entering the bottom of the third inning, falling behind once again, but they’ve been in this spot before and they were looking to rally.

After Evan Williams, the walk-off hero from the night before, drew a walk his teammate Sam Novitske was due up next. Novitske lined a double right above the outstretched glove of third baseman Gage Workman to score Williams and after an errant throw from Drew Swift, Novitske found himself on third base.

Jonny DeLuca followed with a sacrifice-fly to right field that scored Novitske, getting a rather silent 1,150 at PK Park into the game with the game tied at 2-2 going into the fourth inning.

Brett Walker, the starting pitcher for Oregon, quickly found himself in trouble early on in the fourth. Walker, after going three innings giving up four runs on seven hits, was pulled from the game after Lyle Lin and Workman reached second and third, bringing in Christian Ciuffetelli to try and stop the bleeding. Sam Ferri quickly hit a double to left-center to score Lin. Workman quickly scored following a wild pitch.

The bleeding stopped only momentarily. With no outs, Ciuffetelli was able to get two outs and then walking Spencer Torkelson. Hunter Bishop followed with a double to right center field scoring Ferri, but a throwing error by DeLuca would bring in Torkelson, providing the knockout punch for Oregon, eventually giving ASU a 7-3 win and series victory.
“They just pound you when you make mistakes like that, we gave them free bases and didn’t throw the ball accurately,” head coach George Horton said recalling all his teams mistakes in the fourth inning. “Pretty expensive in the big scheme of things because it changes the whole dynamic of the game.”

Oregon, despite trailing by four, was kept in the game by their bullpen for the remainder of the game. Ciuffetelli along with Keaton Chase and Nico Tellache would combine for six innings only giving up one run between the fifth and ninth innings.

“Nice to see those guys growing up a little bit, not at the expense of losing, of course, but we have to get some more consistency in parts of our game if we’re going to compete in this conference,” Horton said.

The bullpen kept Oregon in the game, giving it a chance to win.

The Ducks left 10 men on base, but the most two left on were in the bottom of the eighth inning.

Oregon had a man on second and third with two outs and A.J. Miller, who came in for Max Foxcroft following a 0-3 day. Miller, who has home-run power, was unable cash in for Oregon and struck out swinging.

“We played the home-run card and it’s not a card that we play often,” Horton said. “They set the table for us…we weren’t up to the challenge, unfortunately, good teams make the opposition pay.”

The Ducks will head to Provo, Utah, for two midweek games against BYU on Tuesday and Utah Valley on Wednesday.

Follow Gabriel on Twitter @gabe_ornelas