Oregon State third baseman Matthew Gretler smacked a seventh-inning home run off Vanderbilt’s Grayson Moore, accounting for the final run in the Beavers’ 7-6 win over Vanderbilt in the deciding game of the Corvallis regional of the NCAA baseball tournament at Goss Stadium on Monday afternoon.
The Commodores led 3-2 after 4 1/2 innings but fell behind after OSU plated four runs against reliever Patrick Reilly in the fifth inning in what proved to be the difference-making inning.
Vanderbilt ended its season at 39-23. The Commodores had just five hits, with Spencer Jones and Davis Diaz each accumulating two. Jones hit a towering home run in the fourth that gave Vanderbilt its first lead of the day at 2-1.
The difference was pitching; Oregon State simply had more at the end.
All-American starting pitcher Cooper Hjerpe, who threw 100 pitches in the Beavers’ Friday win over New Mexico State, threw two scoreless innings with five strikeouts to end the game. Two of the Beavers’ better bullpen arms—Ben Ferrer and Reid Sebby—combined for 3 2/3 innings of four-run ball, though just one was earned.
As for Vanderbilt, it pinned its hopes on talented sophomore Christian Little to start the day. Little did his best work out of the bullpen this year and on Monday, mostly pitched well—three innings, one run.
But control issues (three walks) led to a 70-pitch count, which in turn forced the Commodores to turn to Reilly early, staring the turnstile of bullpen arms that eventually led to their undoing.
Reilly had trouble with control and command much of the year. Tose problems reappeared against one of the country’s most talented and patient lineups. Reilly threw 1 2/3 innings, allowed five runs (all earned), gave up six hits and five runs.
OSU’s Travis Bazzana led off the forty against Reilly by blistering a drive to left-center, where Enrique Bradfield Jr. ran a mile and made a leaping catch against the wall to take away extra bases.
That was a temporary reprieve. Jake Dukart doubled and No. 9 hitter Kyle Dernedde (who entered Tuesday batting .207) got a ground ball through the middle of the infield to tie the game.
Vandy pulled ahead again in the fifth. Bradfield walked with two outs and after he stole second, Javier Vaz was hit by a pitch. Jones struck out for a second out but Bradfield and Vaz then pulled off a double steal, and when the ball got away on a throw from second, Bradfield trotted home for a 3-2 lead.
But OSU’s Garrett Forrester had a one-out infield single in the fifth and then Jacob Melton, the Pac-12 Player of the Year, hit a ball to the opposite alley in right that kept carrying and left the yard to give the Beavers a 4-3 advantage.
It got worse for Reilly, who, with two outs, gave up a single and a hit batsman before Dernedde singled up the middle to extend the OSU lead to three.
Vanderbilt, however, got an enormous break in the sixth when, with Diaz on first and Parker Noland on second, and Ferrer having issues trying to hit the outside corner again and again, Tate Kolwyck grounded to Dermedde at second for what looked like the third out.
But the ball slipped between Dermedde’s legs and into center and a run scored. Bradfield then slapped a run-scoring single to left to cut the lead to one, forcing Ferrer from the game.
In the seventh, Jones beat the tag to tie it at 6 on a sacrifice fly to right by Calvin Hewett.
But that lead was short-lived when Gretler homered to left off Moore (1 2/3 innings, one run, two strikeouts) with one out in the seventh.
Little gave Vanderbilt all he had after a tough start. He fell behind 2-1 to leadoff man Justin Boyd in the first, and Boyd cranked a just-below-the-belt fastball for a no-doubt home run to left-center for a 1-0 OSU lead.
Meanwhile, Vanderbilt had trouble with Jaren Hunter’s breaking ball and change-up, pitches that sat around 81-92. He threw a perfect first and second and struck out five of the first six he saw.
Hunter struck out Bradfield, Jones and Dominic Keegan the first time around with that breaking ball, then, got Noland on a 3-2 change-up in the second also, and Hewett looking on an 89-mile-an-hour fastball that caught the inner corner.
By that time, Little’s control had started to falter as he issued one-out walks to Meckler and Forrester. Melton then hit a ball deep into the gap in left-center but Bradfield got a great jump and ran it down. After falling behind Logan 3-1 Little battled back to strike him out swinging on a 91-mile-an-hour fastball to keep the OSU lead at 1-0.
Things flipped for Hunter in the fourth as he lost the control of his pitches that he had earlier.
Vaz led off and coaxed a 3-2 walk and then Hunter went 3-2 on the hot-hitting Jones, who unloaded on the next pitch and cleared the bleachers in right for a 2-1 Vandy lead. Keegan followed with a walk before Noland, on a 3-2 pitch, grounded out for the first out.
Oregon State then went to Ferrer, its best reliever (1.89 ERA, 57 innings, 72 strikeouts, 11 walks) to face Hewett, who got out of the inning with no more damage.
Vanderbilt will now have an offseason to ponder what might have been, especially as it relates to pitching. Oregon State—one of the country’s most patient lineups—had 11 hits, walked six times and reached base twice by hit batsmen.
The Commodores might have wished to have a key pitching decision from Sunday night over again. Vandy, with an 8-1 lead, went to its best reliever Thomas Schultz to finish the last three innings, leaving him unavailable for Monday.
By the seventh inning on on Monday, the Commodores went to freshman Ryan Ginther, who’d thrown 6 1/3 innings all year, to finish the game. Ginther pitched well (1 1/3 innings, no runs, two strikeouts) but the damage had been done and the ‘Dores couldn’t solve Hjerpe at the end.
It's likely the last game for Keegan and Jones, both of whom were electric in Corvallis and should be picked in the first few rounds in the coming June draft.
