OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Oregon State was down three runs when a steady mist moved in at TD Ameritrade Park in the eighth inning Wednesday night.
Perfect conditions for a team from the Pacific Northwest.
“Every time we’re playing and it starts to rain, everyone looks around and says, ‘OK, we’re going to come back and do what we do at home,'” OSU shortstop Cadyn Grenier said. “When the rain comes, we know there’s a possibility of a storm coming — and that’s from us.”
The Beavers stormed back all right and knocked North Carolina out of the College World Series with an 11-6 win.
Brett Daniels walked in the go-ahead run after Adley Rutschman tied it with a three-run double. Tyler Malone hit his second homer of the CWS, and the Beavers’ third of the game, as Oregon State (51-11-1) built a five-run cushion and avenged Saturday’s 8-6 loss to the Tar Heels (44-20).
It was a stunning turnabout after the Tar Heels wiped out a 3-0 deficit to go up 6-3 in the sixth. North Carolina had been 37-0 when leading after seven innings and had won 50 straight when scoring six runs, the longest streak in Division I.
“Until that final out, we never feel we’re out of the game,” OSU star second baseman Nick Madrigal said. “That’s the way Oregon State baseball is. We’re going to fight to the end.”
North Carolina’s eighth-inning meltdown saw three pitchers walk four batters, one intentionally, and allow three hits.
No. 9 batter Zak Taylor started things off with a leadoff single. Madrigal, the No. 4 overall draft pick by the Chicago White Sox, followed with a base hit and Grenier won a 12-pitch duel with Joey Lancelotti to walk and load the bases.
“Zak Taylor got us going,” Madrigal said. “Sometimes it takes one hit to break it open. That’s the way baseball is.”
Rutschman followed with a drive to the center-field wall off Daniels (6-1) for his bases-clearing double.
Daniels then walked two in a row, the first intentionally, to fill the bases again. Daniels ran the count full against Jack Anderson before walking him to force in Rutschman.
Carolina wiped out a 3-0 deficit in the third on Brandon Riley’s two-run double off Luke Heimlich and led 4-3 in the fifth on Ike Freeman’s single. Kyle Datres hooked Christian Chamberlain’s pitch just inside the foul pole, putting the Tar Heels up 6-3 in the sixth.
Jake Mulholland (3-2) pitched three innings of shutout relief for the win.
“They were resilient, they were tough, they fought, they were tough — and they put up with my emotions,” Beavers coach Pat Casey said.
