On the cusp of elimination from the postseason, UCLA baseball will face what is, on paper, the toughest opponent it has seen all season.
But this series won’t be played on paper. It will be played at Goss Stadium in Corvallis, Ore.
The Oregon State Beavers (35-8, 17-4 Pac-12) are the No. 2 team in the country and the top team in the Pac-12. They will seek to mathematically eliminate the Bruins (23-22-1, 10-11) from postseason, as UCLA would have to win its remaining 10 games to have an RPI high enough to have a legitimate chance to be selected to play in the NCAA regionals.
“It’s a funny game. Right when people write people off and say they’re done (that’s when they go on a run). I’ve seen that too many times,” said coach John Savage. “And you know what, this will be a good test. Another good test. All we’ve had are tests this year.”
UCLA will certainly be tested this weekend as Oregon State has won eight straight games and 16 of its last 19.
“They’re about as complete as a team that you’re going to see in the country,” Savage said. “That’s a lot of wins and not many losses.”
The Beavers boast one of the best pitching staffs in the country. The team’s 2.16 earned run average is the best in the conference and in the top five in the nation. Senior southpaw Ben Wetzler (8-1, 0.78 ERA), sophomore Andrew Moore (4-3, 2.81) and junior southpaw Jace Fry (9-1, 1.59) anchor the starting staff.
“On paper … they have, if not the best pitching staff in the country, they clearly have one of the top two or three,” Savage said.
Yet even with the odds not in their favor, the Bruins won’t concern themselves with what they read on the stat sheet.
“Numbers are what you did in the past,” said sophomore outfielder Ty Moore. “So they gotta bring it this weekend just like we do.”
Oregon State also possesses a very potent offense, one that has a team batting average of .280 and has scored 97 more runs than UCLA this year.
Savage said that he is going to need quality starts from his starting pitchers to give UCLA a chance to win. The biggest challenge will be executing with runners in scoring position, a facet of the game that the Bruins have struggled with all season.
“We’re struggling to score runs. We can get guys on, we can get them over, (but) we just can’t get them in. We need to get that timely hit,” Moore said. “We need to have that mindset that we have in practice and in those (situational hitting) drills, we need to have that mindset on the field and take that to the game.”
If there’s one positive going forward, it’s that seven of the remaining 10 games on the schedule are on the road, where UCLA is 12-5-1. Their comfort away from Jackie Robinson Stadium could be a huge factor if the Bruins do indeed get hot and go on a run.
“There’s no reason we can’t. As you saw last year, we can go on a run at any time,” said senior first baseman Pat Gallagher. “We’re not thinking about those 10 games right now off the bat, we’re thinking about one game at a time. … Hopefully, good things will come from that.”