Oregon State Rallies to Shock No. 2 Arizona State

Oregon State starter Mike Stutes took a no-hitter into the eighth inning and ended the night allowing three hits and four runs.

John Wallace’s single to center became the game-winner as the Oregon State baseball team scored five in the ninth for a 6-4 comeback victory over No. 2 Arizona State Friday night at Packard Stadium.

TEMPE, Ariz. - John Wallace’s single to center became the game-winner as the Oregon State baseball team scored five in the ninth for a 6-4 comeback victory over No. 2 Arizona State Friday night at Packard Stadium.

Wallace’s single broke a 4-4 tie and the Beavers added an insurance run before Kevin Rhoderick came on in the ninth for his seventh save of the season. Oregon State’s five-run ninth offset Arizona State’s three-run eighth that seemingly gave Arizona State a commanding 4-1 lead.

Jordan Lennerton started off the ninth with a one-out walk, then moved to second when Daniel Robertson singled to center. That set up Lonnie Lechelt’s second triple of the season, a fly down the left field line that nearly evaded the diving glove of Ryan Sontag, which allowed both Lennerton and Robertson to score and pulling OSU to within one, 4-3. The three straight hits came off reliever Tommy Rafferty, and Lechelt’s triple chased him in favor of Reyes Dorado.

Dorado immediately gave up a single through the left side to Chris Hopkins, scoring Lechelt, and tying the game at four. Joey Wong then walked, and moved to third on Wallace’s game-winning single. The 10-pitch at bat drove in Hopkins from second and set up Jason Ogata’s sacrifice fly to left that drove in Wong and gave OSU a 6-4 lead.

“This was an excellent game with a postseason-type atmosphere,” Oregon State head coach Pat Casey said. “Mike Stutes came in and had an excellent outing and we did a real good job of coming on late offensively against a very good Arizona State team. It’s tough to get wins on the road in the Pac-10.”

Oregon State starter Mike Stutes took a no-hitter into the eighth inning and ended the night allowing three hits and four runs while walking just three. The right-hander threw 124 pitches, his second-highest count of the season, in 7 2/3 innings, which was his longest outing of the season.

Stutes moved through the first seven innings, allowing a solo run in the third on a sacrifice fly. All nine of his strikeouts came in the first seven innings. In the eighth, he allowed a single to Matt Newman, which broke up the no-hitter. Raoul Torrez moved him to second on a sacrifice bunt, then Stutes got Sontag to fly out to center.

Brett Wallace then intentionally walked, setting up a run-scoring single by Jason Kipnis. Ike Davis made it 3-1 with another single, and Petey Paramore doubled off reliever Kraig Sitton to cap the inning and make it 4-1 in favor of Arizona State.

Because Oregon State (17-12 overall, 5-5 Pacific-10 Conference) scored five runs in the ninth inning, Stutes did not figure in the decision.

The win belonged to Greg Peavey, who worked just 1/3 of an inning in relief of Sitton. Peavey threw three pitches, but that’s all he needed to help keep Arizona State at bay before Oregon State’s five-run ninth. Peavey improved to 2-1 this season.

Rhoderick, meanwhile, allowed the first two batters he faced to reach base in the ninth off a walk and single. But he came back to get two straight strikeouts and a groundout to ice the game.

Arizona State (30-5, 6-4) starter Mike Leake also impressed for the Sun Devils, going eight full innings before being replaced by Rafferty to start the ninth. Like Stutes, Leake had a heavy pitch count on Friday, throwing 119, which produced nine strikeouts and two walks. He scattered five hits and one run and also did not figure in the decision.

Dorado took the loss after allowing two hits and two runs and failing to get an out. He dropped to 3-1 this season.

Oregon State jumped on the board first for the 18th time this season, taking a 1-0 lead in the top of the second. Ryan Ortiz reached on an infield single with one out and stayed at first as Leake was able to record the second out of the inning. But Oregon State’s next batter, Lennerton, did not fall prey to Leake, instead hitting a double off the base of the fence in right field that enabled Ortiz to come around from first, beating a throw that pulled the catcher up the third base line.

Arizona State, however, was able to even the score, 1-1, in the third. The Sun Devils, with one out, managed to get the bases loaded on a hit batter and two straight walks off Stutes. Kipnis then hit a deep fly to left that brought in Raoul Torrez from third. Stutes was able to get out of the inning without any further damage when he induced Ike Davis to ground out to Wong at short.

The clubs play the second game of the series Saturday at 6 p.m. PST. The game will be carried live on the Beaver Sports Network, Beaver Nation Online (www.osubeavers.com) and Yahoo! Sports. Additionally, the game can be heard nationwide on XM Radio, channel 193.

OSU Notes: Prior to the game Friday, it was announced that Oregon State and Portland would resume their suspended game on April 23 at 2 p.m., with the regularly scheduled game still to begin at 5 p.m. ... OSU holds a 3-0 lead after three and a half innings in the game that was stopped because of rain at PGE Park on April 15 ... Mike Stutes moved into sixth place in OSU history in career strikeouts, and has 253 for his three-year career at OSU ... Including his totals at Santa Clara, Stutes has 306 as a collegiate pitcher ...Friday night’s game was the 53rd all-time meeting between Oregon State and Arizona State and the seventh between the clubs in the last two seasons ... The series against the Sun Devils is the third straight for Oregon State against top-10 clubs ... OSU played at No. 7 California from April 4-6 and then hosted No. 10 Stanford from April 11-13 ... Jason Ogata extended his hit streak to six games with a single in the fourth ... Drew George also moved his to five games with a single in the fourth ... Jordan Lennerton’s run-scoring, second-inning double extended his hit streak to four games.

Source: OSU Athletics

Adding comments to these stories has been disabled. View the current sports stories Salem-News Sports