When Mitch Canham decided to give the Oregon State Beavers a two-day break following their flop at the Pac-12 baseball tournament, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of unease.
Would they put the unexpected late-season time off to good use? Would it help revive and refresh a once-hot team that surprisingly went two-and-out?
Or would it backfire and sap the momentum out of a group that, before its Scottsdale struggles, had been playing exceptionally well?
“I was curious,” he said. “Sometimes that can be scary, because all you want to do is just work, work, work.”
If the first game of the Baton Rouge Regional is any indication, the two-day reprieve was time well spent.
Trent Sellers pitched his best game at Oregon State and the offense slugged its way to a record-setting night, carrying the Beavers to a dominant 18-2 victory over the Sam Houston Bearkats Friday night in their opener of the NCAA baseball tournament.
The second-seeded Beavers (40-18) advanced to the winners’ bracket of the four-team regional, where they will face No. 5 national seed and host LSU on Saturday night.
“It seemed like all the guys came back fresh,” Canham said of last week’s 48-hour break from baseball. “And it paid some strong dividends today.”
Indeed, it was an impressive opening-round performance by the Beavers, who — outside of a little shaky early base running — played a dominant and near-flawless game. The lineup was lethal, setting single-game postseason school records for home runs (four), hits (22) and total bases (37). And, after the first inning, Sellers was untouchable, breezing through one of the nation’s most formidable lineups with four overwhelming pitches.
The impressive outing had to make even the most pessimistic member of Beaver Nation feel emboldened about Oregon State’s chances against the intimidating Tigers, who spent 12 weeks this season at the top of the rankings and feature one of the deepest lineups in college baseball.
“The chatter in the dugout, the look in their eye, the demeanor in which they went about today was outstanding,” Canham said of the Beavers.
It was over early at Alex Box Stadium, where, after a shaky top of the first, the Beavers steamrolled the Bearkats (38-24). Eleven of the first 15 Oregon State batters recorded hits, including the first four, and all nine starters finished with at least one in the game as the Beavers — who hit .366 and averaging 11.0 runs per game in May — continued their torrid hitting.
Micah McDowell, who had a career night, ignited the fireworks in the bottom of the first, when he belted a three-run home run to right-center field to give the Beavers a 3-2 lead. The next batter, Mason Guerra, hit a ball over the left field bleachers and out of the stadium, to push the lead to 4-2. And the offense didn’t let up the rest of the night, smacking four home runs and three doubles, while scoring runs in seven of the eight innings that OSU batted.
In addition to the trio of postseason records the Beavers broke, they also fell one run shy of equaling the school-record for postseason runs, set against St. John’s in a 2005 regional.
The top five hitters in the Beavers’ lineup produced a combined 16 hits and seven of the nine Oregon State starters finished with multi-hit games. McDowell went 4 for 4 with a three-run home run, six RBIs and four runs scored, Gavin Turley finished 3 for 4 with a home run, two doubles and six RBIs and Travis Bazzana went 4 for 6 with two runs scored. McDowell and Turley tied the school-record for RBIs in a postseason game.
“I think this is the best day I’ve ever had as a player,” McDowell said.
It was also the best day Sellers has had with the Beavers and that, more than the offensive eruption, was perhaps Friday’s biggest development.
The Beavers will play the rest of the way without weekend starters Jacob Kmatz and Jaren Hunter, who are sidelined indefinitely with arm injuries. That reality shifted pressure onto Sellers to pitch well and deep Friday — to help save bullpen arms for the rest of the regional — and he delivered his best start with the Beavers, striking out five and allowing just two runs on three hits over a season-high 7 1/3 innings.
Sellers (7-5) gave up a double and home run to his first two batters, then mowed through the Sam Houston lineup, leaning on a dazzling changeup and curveball to frustrate a potent lineup that entered the game ranked sixth in the nation in runs scored (527) and tied for eighth in batting average (.320).
He retired 20 consecutive batters from the end of the first to the start of the eighth, working ahead in the count and keeping the Bearkats off-balance with his off-speed pitches.
“You have to tip your hat to (Sellers),” Bearkats coach Jay Sirianni said. “He did a really good job of suffocating the strike zone and getting the leadoff guy. That’s kind of been our MO as of late — pressure — and (he) did a good job tonight.”
It helped that Sellers has pitched in big playoff games before, starring for his old team, Lewis & Clark State, in the NAIA World Series the last two seasons. But even more, Sellers was aided by a couple late-season tweaks, most notably the use of a windup delivery. He has pitched the last three seasons, including all but his final start of the regular season, almost exclusively out of the stretch.
But Sellers has a bad habit of rushing on the mound, which speeds up both his mind and delivery, causing him to lose control of his pitches. So heading into the final week of the regular season, pitching coach Rich Dorman convinced Sellers to employ a windup delivery, among other tweaks, to slow things down. It went well in the season-finale, when Sellers struck out eight and allowed just four hits and two runs in a no-decision against Western Carolina. And it went even better on Friday — after a shaky first couple of batters.
“I felt a little weird coming out of the bullpen getting into the game,” Sellers said of his pregame bullpen session. “I was pushing everything, instead of just flicking it. But after that home run I gave up, I really locked it down and started using not just my fastball, but my changeup, slider (and) curveball.
“I felt really good out of (the windup). I felt it was comfortable. I had better command, as well.”
Sellers’ standout performance spared the bullpen and set the Beavers up nicely for the rest of the regional. Canham refused to divulge who he was planning on starting against the Tigers, but it likely will be Ben Ferrer or AJ Lattery, a pair of veterans with boast big-game experience.
No matter who starts, he’ll enjoy the luxury of pitching alongside a lethal lineup that could carry the Beavers far in the postseason.
Oh what a difference a couple days of R&R make.
Joe Freeman reported from Baton Rouge, Louisiana
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