OSU Beats Rice, Will Play For Baseball National Title - Oregon State University Athletics

OMAHA, Neb. – Pitching on just two days’ rest, Oregon State’s Jonah Nickerson allowed just two hits in 7 2/3 innings as the No. 8-ranked Beavers beat No. 1 Rice 2-0 Thursday night at Rosenblatt Stadium to advance to the championship series of the College World Series. OSU (48-15 overall) managed just three hits of its own, but handed Nickerson single runs in the second and fifth innings, and Kevin Gunderson recorded the final four outs of the two-hitter.

Oregon State will now play No. 9 North Carolina for the national championship in a best-of-three series that starts Saturday at 4 p.m. PDT, continues Sunday at 4 p.m. PDT and would conclude Monday at 4 p.m. PDT if a third game is necessary. The first and third games can be seen on the ESPN cable network and the second game can be seen on ESPN2; all of the Beavers’ games in the CWS can be heard on KEJO-AM (1240) in the Corvallis area, KUIK-AM (1360) in the Portland area, KKNX-AM (840) in the Eugene area, KRNR-AM (1490) in the Roseburg area, KMED-AM (1440) in the Medford area, KICE-AM (940) in the Bend area and KNPT-AM (1310) in the Newport area.

On Thursday, the Beavers posted the first back-to-back CWS shutouts since Pepperdine turned the trick in 1992; OSU had won Wednesday’s game on a combined shutout by Daniel Turpen and Joe Paterson. The Beavers rode that momentum to another win over the Owls (57-13) – their fourth straight victory after losing their opening game of the CWS to Miami (Fla.).

“Winning four straight games is just characteristic of this club,” OSU head coach Pat Casey said. “They’ve done it all year long. They’ve worked so hard – they work their tails off, play together and have a will to win. These are tough kids who work together. It was a long road; we’re looking forward to a day off.”

Especially Nickerson, who had pitched seven innings to earn a win over Georgia on Monday. On Thursday, he tossed the 7 2/3 shutout innings and allowed the two hits and three walks while striking out nine.

“I saw Jonah in the hallway (at OSU’s hotel) last night, and he said he was ready to go,” Casey said. “We thought if he could go five innings, we can go to the pen. He came out and he was outstanding. The guys were able to score runs against great Rice pitchers.”

Said Nickerson: “My arm felt good. I thought I could start yesterday, but the coaches didn’t consider that. I was ready to go and prepared. It was like a normal start other than I had no legs below me. My arm felt good. I did throw a little more off-speed pitches, I pitched a little backward (in the count). You don’t prepare to pitch on two days’ rest, but I took care of my arm.”

In the process of beating Rice, Nickerson ran his strikeout total for the season to 124, breaking OSU's 38-year-old school record for strikeouts in a season. The old mark of 121 had been set by Ken Forsch in 1968; Forsch went on to pitch 15 seasons for the Houston Astros and California Angels.

OSU was facing Rice righthander Eddie Degerman, who entered the game with a 13-1 record and a 1.93 earned run average. Bill Rowe led off the second inning by pulling a double into the leftfield corner, was wild-pitched to second with one out, and scored on Mitch Canham’s sacrifice fly.

“I felt like we had a lot of momentum,” Rowe said. “Looking in the Rice dugout yesterday and tonight, they didn’t look like they were going to come back and beat us.”

Oregon State tacked on its second run in the fifth inning as Chris Kunda and Shea McFeely both singled just inside the third-base bag to start the inning, with Kunda taking third on McFeely’s single and McFeely advancing to second as the Owls tried to throw Kunda out at third on the play. Darwin Barney walked to load the bases with one out, then John Wallace’s sharp grounder glanced off Degerman’s leg and the Owls’ only play was to throw Wallace out as Kunda scored from third.

Nickerson, meanwhile, had allowed a two-out single to Aaron Luna in the second inning and then had a one-out walk erased with a double play in the third. Rice threatened when Nickerson issued a pair of walks in the fifth inning, but he caught pinch-hitter Kenny Ford looking at a third strike to end the inning with runners at first and second.

“He kept the ball low and pitched a good game,” Rice third baseman Josh Rodriguez said of Nickerson. “He played the ball well. Our bats just went dead. They pitched well and we just couldn’t get anyone on base. It’s hard to press when you can’t get people on.”

Rice’s only baserunner the rest of the way came when Joe Savery doubled down the rightfield line with one out in the seventh. Luna followed with a flyout to deep rightfield that advanced Savery to third, but Nickerson got Danny Lehmann to fly out to left to end the inning with OSU still up 2-0.

“Even though the best team’s bats can sometimes go cold, it’s even harder when the opposing team is pitching well,” Rice head coach Wayne Graham said. “Oregon State is a great ballclub; they deserved to win. Our pitching did a good job of keeping us in the game.”

Nickerson fanned the final hitter he faced, then was replaced by Gunderson with two out and the bases empty in the bottom of the eighth when the Owls went back to the top of their batting order. Gunderson fanned Tyler Henley to end the inning, then got three flyouts in the ninth to send OSU to the championship series.

“With our pitching and defense, it’s phenomenal,” Canham said. “We had outstanding pitching; all our starters threw well.”

Oregon State 2 (48-15) Rice 0 (57-13)

Player AB R H BI Player AB R H BI

--------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------

Barney, Darwin ss.......... 2 0 0 0 Tyler Henley cf............ 4 0 0 0

Wallace, John rf........... 4 0 0 1 Greg Buchanan 2b........... 4 0 0 0

Gillespie, Cole lf......... 3 0 0 0 Brian Friday ss............ 4 0 0 0

Rowe, Bill 1b.............. 3 1 1 0 Josh Rodriguez 3b.......... 4 0 0 0

Graham, Tyler cf........... 3 0 0 0 Joe Savery 1b.............. 3 0 1 0

Canham, Mitch c............ 3 0 0 1 Aaron Luna lf.............. 2 0 1 0

Kunda, Chris 2b............ 4 1 1 0 Danny Lehmann c............ 3 0 0 0

McFeely, Shea 3b........... 3 0 1 0 Jordan Dodson rf........... 2 0 0 0

Santschi, Scott dh......... 3 0 0 0 Derek Myers dh............. 0 0 0 0

Nickerson, Jonah p......... 0 0 0 0 Kenny Ford ph............. 1 0 0 0

Gunderson, Kevin p........ 0 0 0 0 Adam Zornes ph............ 1 0 0 0

Eddie Degerman p........... 0 0 0 0

Bryce Cox p............... 0 0 0 0

Totals..................... 28 2 3 2 Totals..................... 28 0 2 0

Score by Innings R H E

-------------------------------------------

Oregon State........ 010 010 000 - 2 3 0

Rice................ 000 000 000 - 0 2 0

-------------------------------------------

DP - Oregon St. 1. LOB - Oregon St. 5; Rice 4. 2B - Rowe; Savery. HBP - Rowe. SH -

Graham. SF - Canham. SB - Luna.

Oregon State IP H R ER BB SO

------------------------------------------------

Nickerson, Jonah W,13-4... 7.2 2 0 0 3 9

Gunderson, Kevin S,19..... 1.1 0 0 0 0 1

Rice IP H R ER BB SO

------------------------------------------------

Eddie Degerman L,13-2..... 4.2 3 2 2 3 5

Bryce Cox ................. 4.1 0 0 0 0 6

WP - Degerman. HBP - by Cox (Rowe).

Umpires - HP: Randy Harvey 1B: Joe Burleson 2B: Perry Costello 3B: John Kleis

Start: 7:08 pm Time: 2:29 Attendance: 19161