Over the weekend, No.3 Stanford baseball fell to Arizona in the semifinals of the Pac-12 Tournament by a final score of 14-4 despite being the top seed in the tournament. In pool play, Stanford defeated Cal 18-10 and fell to Oregon 8-6, advancing to the semifinals by way of tiebreaker.
The way the tournament works is there are nine teams in three pools. The winners of each pool advances to the semifinals plus one wild card by virtue of tiebreaker. Stanford did not win their pool (Oregon), but still advanced to the semifinals since they had the best record of the teams that did not win their pool.
At this point, Stanford will await their seeding in the NCAA Tournament. They are a lock to make the tournament, but what’s unclear is whether or not they’ll get a top eight seed, which would guarantee the chance to host a Super Regional should they win their regional. They’ll find out for sure on Monday at Noon ET on ESPN2.
This tournament perfectly encapsulated the kind of season Stanford has had. Offense went wild some days, it was moderate other days, and then the pitching had one really bad day.
In the 18-10 victory over Cal, Braden Montgomery and Carter Graham each hit three RBIs, with Montgomery hitting a home run as well. Alberto Rios also hit a homer plus two RBIs. As for the pitching, Brandt Pancer picked up the win in a relief role, pitching 0.2 innings. Matt Scott lasted 4.1 innings as a starter and gave up five runs (three earned), which was actually better than some of his recent outings while Toran O’Harran fell apart, giving up four earned runs in 0.2 innings pitched. This was a game where the offense truly came to the rescue.
The 8-6 loss to Oregon, who went on to win the tournament, was a game that Stanford should have won. At the end of the 2nd inning, Stanford led 6-2, scoring four runs in the bottom of the 1st inning and two runs in the bottom of the 2nd. From there, Oregon found a way to rally back, scoring two runs in the bottom of the 9th to tie the game up 6-6 and force extra innings. In the top of the 10th, Oregon added two runs while Stanford was unable to respond in the bottom of the 10th. This loss really stings for Stanford because they got off to such a strong start. Pancer was awarded the loss, giving up the go-ahead run in the top of the 10th as Sabin Ceballos hit a solo shot to give the Ducks a one run lead before a wild pitch by Max Meier gave the Ducks an extra run later on in the inning.
As for the 14-4 loss to Arizona, this one was a disaster for the Cardinal. Quinn Mathews got the start on the mound and he didn’t get through two innings as Arizona took an 8-2 lead at the end of the 2nd inning. This one was one-way traffic for the Wildcats. Mathews would get credited with the loss.
While they did not win the tournament and went 1-2, Stanford cannot let this bog them down too much. A team they can look to for inspiration right now is their softball counterparts. Stanford softball had a rocky end to their regular season at home against Washington and also failed to win the Pac-12 Tournament. Rather than folding, they won their regional and then went on to sweep Duke on the road in the Super Regional to reach the Women’s College World Series. Stanford baseball needs to take a page out of their book and put this disappointing tournament behind them. It’ll be interesting to see how they respond and what seed they get on Monday.
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