Moore Stifles NDSU In Beaver’s Regional Opener Win

Mandatory Credit: Jaime Valdez-USA TODAY Sports

Andrew Moore struck out a career best fourteen through eight innings as the Beavers won an otherwise ugly opening regional for Oregon State in Corvallis. The Beavers go on to face the third-seed UC-Irvine, who beat fellow regional participant two-seed UNLV Friday, 10-3.

The Bison took an early lead in the top of the second inning when Kyle Kreinendorst smacked a solo home run. North Dakota State would not send a runner past first base for the next six innings.

Oregon State quickly answered back in the bottom half of the second, loading the bases with one out for shortstop Trevor Morrison, who drove in Gabe Clark on a single, tying the game at one run apiece.

While Moore held the Bison at bey from the mound, the Beaver offense was having struggles of it’s own. Oregon State left eleven runners on base in the contest, adding an unneeded level of angst for the capacity crowd viewing the Beaver’s regional at Goss Stadium.

The game remained nervously knotted at 1-1 until Dylan Davis approached the plate with two outs in the seventh. The Redmond, Wash. senior blasted a frozen rope round-tripper over the left-center gap portion of  the fence, giving the Beavers the 2-1 advantage they would need to claim victory six outs later.

Lefty Max Engelbrekt relieved Moore to start the ninth inning. Moore’s fourteen strikeouts in eight innings broke the previously held school record of 11 strikeouts in a postseason game, a mark set by Matt Boyd against Indiana last year. Engelbrekt struck out his man, Tim Colwell, and was subsequently relieved by closer Scott Schultz.

Schultz gave up a quick single but induced two fly outs to seal the win and a birth in the next round of the Corvallis regional for home team Oregon State. The win also preserves Oregon State’s perfect record at Goss Stadium in the post season, pushing their program record to 13-0 (27-16 overall).

Oregon State will look to keep things moving against UC-Irvine Saturday evening, following the elimination game to be played between the UNLV Runnin’ Rebs and the North Dakota State Bison. The loser of the OSU-Irvine game will play the winner of the NDSU-UNLV game to determine who will play the winner of the OSU-Irvine game for the chance to move on to the Super Regionals next weekend.