Beaver Baseball: Bruins Travel North for OSU Home Finale

As the season goes on the margins grow thinner, and the Beavers have used up most of what they have left. Oregon State can’t win the final regular season Pac-12 baseball title this weekend, but they can lose it.

Arizona goes into this weekend with a 2.5 game lead over Oregon State and matches up against 2nd place Utah in Salt Lake City. The Beavers need to at a minimum keep pace with the Wildcats this weekend to have a chance at taking the regular season title next weekend and will need a sweep combined with some Utah success to close the gap and not have to count on a road sweep in Tuscon to do so. Oregon State has swept 2 of their 4 home conference series this year, and 4 of 6 overall.

The Beavers need this win for more than just a Pac-12 title. OSU has gone from a consensus top 8 national seed to being out of the hosting game entirely in the last D1 Baseball Tournament Field projections. A strong finish to the regular season and a deep run in the Pac-12 Tournament will likely get the Beavs back up from their current RPI of 15 and comfortably in the hosting picture, while a slide will send the Beavs packing in a similar fashion to last year.

UCLA has consistently been at the top of the recruiting rankings, including in the last three years under head coach Chip Hale. The former Arizona Diamondbacks manager has brough the talent to campus, but injuries contributed to a late season slide last year that resulted in the Bruins missing the NCAA tournament for the first time in his tenure. It is almost certain that will remain the same in 2024 as the Burins sit comfortably in last place in the Pac-12 and have been swept in 4 of their 8 Pac-12 series.

It should be a beautiful weekend for baseball in Corvallis to wrap up the regular season schedule, with clear skies and temperatures in the 70s for gametimes. Games this weekend will be broadcast on the Pac-12 Network and over the radio on the Beaver Sports Network.

• Friday May 10th @ 7:00 PM PT
• Saturday May 11th @ 5:00 PM PT
• Sunday May 12th @ 12:00 PM PT

Offense

On the positive side, UCLA 2B Duce Gourson was expected to be a leader of this offense coming into the year and has delivered with a .286/.433/.500 line and a team leading 15 home runs. Freshman Roch Cholowsky has is in the running for Pac-12 Freshman of the Year with 12 home runs of his own and a .829 OPS while manning the hot corner.

From there, the Bruins lineup has its share of disappointments. SS Cody Schrier was supposed to be right there with Gourson but has limped to a .236/.315/.357 slash line so far this year. DH Jack Holman was 2nd on the team in home runs with 13 last year but has only 4 this year and is hitting .242. With all of the offensive fireworks in college baseball this year, UCLA has been unable to set off much in Jackie Robinson Stadium this year.

The Beavers will be looking to carry forward the momentum of the last two games in which they have scored a combined 30 runs. The weather in Corvallis this weekend should let the ball travel just fine and unleash the power that is Oregon State’s biggest strength at the plate. Travis Bazzana had a wild series against UCLA last year, going 9-for-16 with 2 home runs and a stolen base in the Beavers series win. He got the bat going again against Washington State and would expect that his aggressive approach will carry on into this series.

Mason Guerra continues to struggle and that is starting to eat into his at bats. He came off the bench in the 2nd game of the Washington State series and was lifted for a pinch hitter on Monday against Gonzaga. He can find solace in teammate Gavin Turley, who experienced as much or more struggles during last year’s Pac-12 season before being one of the best hitters in a regional that featured the National Champions and #2 overall pick Dylan Crews.

Advantage: Oregon State

Starting Pitching

Junior righty Luke Jewett has a mid-90s fastball to pair with a curveball, slider and changeup. He owns both of the Bruins best pitched games of the year, a scoreless 8 inning, 9 strikeout performance last weekend against Cal State Fullerton and a 7 inning start allowing one run and striking out 7 against Utah back in April.

Michael Barnett is a right-handed sophomore who was a weekday starter last year and was a teammate of Bazzana in the Cape Cod League over the summer. He is has a four-pitch mix that allows him to attack hitters on both sides of the plate. He doesn’t strike out a lot of guys, but limits hard contact, with a .380 SLG against.

Landon Stump has been a weekend starter for UCLA for much of the year but was replaced by weekday starter and fellow freshman Luke Rodriguez against Cal State Fullerton last weekend. Rodriguez turned in a modest 4.2 innings with 3 runs allowed but struck out 26% of batter faced and a 1.43 WHIP.

We went into last weekend hoping for three solid starts from the Beavers rotation and ended up getting one. As Aiden May gets more innings under his belt he is establishing himself as the ace the Beavers hoped he would be going into the season. The junior is riding a 16.1 inning scoreless streak coming into the weekend.

It’s hard to worry too much about Jacob Kmatz or Eric Segura’s starts from last weekend, but both will look to bounce back this weekend and the Beavers will need it if they want to put themselves in position for next weekend’s series.

Advantage: Oregon State

Bullpen

Pitching was supposed to be the calling card of this UCLA team, but outside of their Friday and Saturday starters, few have stepped up to fill the void, resulting in a team ERA of 5.10. Rashad Ruff is the closer and has struck out 53 in 45.1 innings this year, while Cody Delvecchio (26 IP, 2.42 ERA) and JonJon Vaughns (18.2 IP, 3.38 ERA) have also played well. The issue is that outside of them, too many innings have gone to guys like Justin Lee (33 IP, 9.00 ERA) and Caedon Kottinger (14.2 IP, 8.59 ERA) who have been unable to keep teams contained.

Nelson Keljo has been coming on strong in recent weeks and is just behind Joey Mundt in my personal Middle Reliever Trust rankings. A couple of interesting things to keep an eye on this weekend are some pitchers that have not seen the mound in some time. Laif Palmer has not pitched since April 21st when he allowed 2 runs in less than an inning against Cal. He had struggled since striking out the side in a midweek start against Gonzaga to start his season. Noah Furgeson has not pitched since Saturday of that same Cal series, when he pitched a third of an inning and walked two. Furgeson was part of the regular bullpen rotation up until then and was pitching to a 3.86 ERA (although the 19% walk rate would indicate regression is/was coming at some point).

Advantage: Push