Over the weekend, Stanford baseball swept the Rice Owls in a three game series. Stanford is now 6-5 overall while Rice is now 3-8. I’ve already written a recap of Friday’s game. If you missed that, you can check that out below.
RECAP: Stanford BSB picks up Friday night victory over Rice
As for Saturday and Sunday, below is a breakdown of what happened:
BOX SCORE: Stanford at Rice-Saturday, March 2nd
BOX SCORE: Stanford at Rice-Sunday, March 3rd
Starting with Saturday, Stanford won by a final score of 8-2. Stanford freshman lefty Christian Lim (1-2) was the winning pitcher for the Cardinal in a starting role, picking up the first win of his career. Lim struck out 10 batters and gave up only three hits in 6.0 innings pitched. The losing pitcher for the Owls was lefty J.D. McCracken (1-2) in a starting role.
Stanford cruised to a win on Saturday. They scored one run in the top of the 1st inning thanks to Cort MacDonald scoring an unearned run courtesy of an error at second base with Malcolm Moore at the plate. McCracken walked MacDonald before walking Jimmy Nati with no outs. That’s what put MacDonald in scoring position on second base.
Stanford then scored two runs in the top of the 2nd inning as MacDonald hit a two-RBI single up the middle with two outs to bring home Brady Reynolds and Temo Becerra. Stanford thus held a 3-0 run at the end of the 2nd inning as Lim was yet to give up a hit.
Nobody scored in the 3rd, 4th, or 5th innings as Stanford continued to lead 3-0. Lim was able to keep his no-hit bid into the bottom of the 5th inning before giving up a double to center field that was hit by Pierce Gallo.
In the top of the 6th inning, Stanford exploded for five runs. Ethan Hott hit a two-RBI double down the right field line to bring home Brady Reynolds and Luke Lavin; Cort MacDonald hit an RBI single up the middle to bring home Hott and advance Owen Cobb to third base; Nati then hit a two-RBI double down the left field line to bring home MacDonald and Cobb. Stanford wouldn’t score any more runs the rest of the inning or the game for that matter. They would lead 8-0 going into the bottom of the 6th.
From there, Stanford would win by a final score of 8-2 as Rice added a couple of runs in the bottom of the 9th inning. Lim would pitch through the bottom of the 6th inning for Stanford. Righty Trevor Moore pitched the 7th and 8th innings for the Cardinal while righty Ben Reimers pitched the 9th inning. This really was one-way traffic for the Cardinal as the Owls didn’t put up much of a fight.
Moving on to Sunday, Stanford won by a final score of 4-3. Stanford sophomore righty Nick Dugan (3-0) was the winning pitcher for the Cardinal in a starting role while sophomore righty Toran O’Harran picked up his second save of the season. Dugan pitched 5.2 innings, giving up three earned runs and seven hits while also striking out seven batters. The losing pitcher for Rice was righty Ryland Urbanczyk (0-2) in a starting role.
Stanford scored two runs in the top of the 1st and two runs in the top of the 5th. Rice scored two runs in the bottom of the 2nd and one run in the bottom of the 5th. Malcom Moore had two hits, one home run, and three RBIs. Moore’s homer was in the top of the 5th inning as he jacked one over the right field fence to bring home MacDonald. Moore’s other RBI was in the top of the 1st inning as he hit a double to bring home Nati. Moore was the offensive player of the game. In between Dugan’s 5.2 innings pitched and O’Harran’s 1.1 innings, Kassius Thomas pitched 2.0 innings. The bullpen did their job.
The impressive part about Sunday’s win for Stanford is neither team scored in the final four innings. For Stanford to hang to a 4-3 lead for four straight innings shows growth from their defense and pitching staff.
While Rice is clearly not a very good team, it’s still impressive that Stanford was able to pull out the sweep on the road. It’s never easy to sweep a team even if you are at home. So to do this on the road has to feel good for Stanford.
Up next for Stanford is a road game at Cal on Tuesday. It will be a non-league game. Opening pitch is set for 7:00 PM PT on Pac-12 Networks.
CardinalSportsReport.com on Facebook & X (Twitter): @StanfordRivals
Ben Parker on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, & X (Twitter): @slamdunk406
Email: slamdunk406@yahoo.com
