There are days when Oregon baseball (16-3, 4-1 Big Ten) has to grind out wins, the way it did against the Indiana Hoosiers (7-11, 1-4 Big Ten) in game 1 of this weekend’s series to take a tight 3-2 win on Friday. 

Then, there are days like Saturday, when the Ducks blitz an opposing pitcher, take a massive early lead, then shift into cruise control, turning stress-free wins into something of a routine affair early on this season.

The team’s 5-1 win over the Hoosiers on Saturday at a sunny PK Park featured all of those familiar, one-sided hallmarks.

The Ducks’ offense scored runs in the second, third and fourth innings, keyed by Angel Laya’s left-on-left two-run homer. It erased an early Indiana comeback bid started by a solo shot from Hoosier Cole Decker in the third. From there, it turned the keys over to starting pitcher Collin Clarke, getting a dominant one-run, seven-inning start from the junior righty.

“Collin has been pitching really well,” head coach Mark Wasikowski said of Clarke. “He’s a super competitor, you’ve really got to appreciate how competitive he is.”

The fourth-inning onslaught began when a red-hot Drew Smith worked his way back from being down 0-2 to draw a nine-pitch walk. The Ducks filled the rest of the inning with hard contact after that.

The next batter, Laya, homered off the player development center in right, then a double from Brayden Jaska and a single from Ryan Cooney brought in the third run of the inning.

Underpinning the offensive explosion was Clarke’s dominant day on the mound. Working in the low nineties, Clarke located well and, more importantly, avoided hard contact from a Hoosiers team that posted just one hit through the first 4.2 innings.

It wasn’t all perfection for Clarke, who had to battle through a leadoff walk and a dropped fly-ball from the first two hitters in the sixth, but he made the right pitches at the right times and won every moment that mattered — letting the Hoosiers know how he felt along the way as he barked at the Hoosiers, his teammates and anyone that would listen.”

“He’s that way in pitcher fielding practice, he’s that way in bunt defenses, he’s that way in the weight room,” Wasikowski said of Clarke’s competitiveness. “He gets into a mindset, he’s a competitor with anything he does.”

“He’s not very good at it,” Wasikowski said about whether Clarke is able to hone in his competitiveness. “He misses on the overcompetitive side sometimes, but I’d rather have that than anything else. I’m glad he’s in our uniform.

He now has a 2.09 ERA through five starts. Last season, he had a 4.59 through 13.

“I feel good,” Clarke said. “All of my pitches are in the zone and getting ahead of guys, some quick innings here and there. Hell of a couple of plays helped me out on defense.”

Clarke’s impressive day and the Ducks’ offensive explosion in the third were far from the only positives in the series-clinching win.

Laya and Drew Smith both stayed hot, blasting homers and forcing long at-bats throughout. While mainstays Dominic Hellman and Maddox Molony have had decent, but not great starts to the season, Laya and Smith’s emergence as two of the top players in the conference has been remarkable.

Oregon’s defense was spectacular as well, highlighted by outfield grabs from Jax Gimenez and Laya.

“It gets our whole team going,” Clarke said. “I’m not sure if that inning we scored or if it was the inning after but that was the cause of it.”

“He’s an infielder learning how to play outfield,” Wasikowski said of Gimenez. “He’s really going for it, which is great…his defense was really good in center.”

And lastly, highlighted by a combined two scoreless innings from Luke Morgan, Blake Crawford and Michael Meckna, Oregon’s bullpen was near spotless, helping Clarke clinch the win and saving high-end arms for tomorrow’s game as the Ducks go for the sweep.

Of course, strong starting pitching makes everyone’s lives easier, too.

“They’ve been efficient with their pitch counts,” Wasikowski said. “There’s several guys who have not gotten the ball out there much, but it’s because the guys at the front of the rotation have done real well.”

First pitch is set for 12:35 p.m. on Sunday.