Pac-10 Baseball: WSU Upsets No.11 Oregon State Again, 5-3

Washington State lefthander Jayson Miller limited OSU to four hits in his eight innings pitched.

OSU's Mike Lissman Photo: OSU Athletics

CORVALLIS, Ore. - Oregon State’s Mike Lissman homered for the second straight day but the 11th-ranked Beavers lost to Washington State 5-3 in Pac-10 baseball Sunday afternoon at Goss Stadium at Coleman Field.

Braden Wells was 3-for-3 with a run batted in for OSU (36-13 overall, 8-10 Pac-10), which dropped a home series for the first time in nearly three years.

On Sunday before a Mothers Day crowd of 2,113,, WSU (25-22, 8-13) handed OSU its first series loss in its home ballpark since the Beavers dropped two of three games to UCLA to end the 2004 season.

Oregon State had gone 23-0-1 in home series since then, including NCAA Super Regional victories over Southern California and Stanford to reach the College World Series in 2005 and 2006.

OSU trailed Washington State 5-1 going into the bottom of the ninth inning against WSU closer Ross Humes but Jason Ogata doubled with one out and Lissman belted a two-run homer to leftfield to pull the Beavers within 5-3.

Oregon State eventually brought the winning run to the plate but Lonnie Lechelt hit into a bizarre double play to end the game.

Following Lissman’s seventh homer of the season, pinch hitter Erik Ammon walked and Koa Kahalehoe pinch ran for him.

Wells singled to center to bring Lechelt to the plate, and Lechelt drove a ball at the feet of Cougar second baseman Cody Bartlett. Bartlett caught the ball on a short hop and fed it to shortstop Josh Ashenbrenner covering first base for one out, with Kahalehoe retreating to second base.

Lechelt beat the relay throw to first, and Kahalehoe lit out for third base; first baseman Jim Murphy’s throw to third baseman Paul Gran was in time to get Kahalehoe for the third out.

“It shouldn’t have even come down to the ninth inning,” Lissman said. “We played baseball for one of the nine innings today and that’s just terrible on our part. I don’t know what it was – we’ve just got to come out and compete more.”

Washington State lefthander Jayson Miller limited OSU to four hits in his eight innings pitched, walking three and striking out five.

OSU freshman rightander Jorge Reyes suffered his first loss to fall to 4-1 on the season, going 5 2/3 innings and allowing five runs on eight hits and one walk while striking out three.

“Jorge came out and threw well, he gave us a chance to win the ballgame,” Lissman said of Reyes, who retired 10 straight hitters from the second to fifth innings. “If we can’t score more than five runs, we’ve got problems. We’ve just got to keep our heads up; our destiny is still in our hands. That’s one thing – we know we still control what we do. We’re over this; now we’ve got to get ready for Arizona State coming in.”

Washington State took a 2-0 lead by the middle of the second inning as Travis Coulter led off the game with a triple and scored on Scott Suttmeier’s sacrifice fly, then in the second inning Mike Gilbert homered to right.

OSU got back within 2-1 when Jason Ogata led off the bottom of the second with a double and scored on Wells’ two-out single to center.

The Cougars built their lead to 5-1 with a run in the fifth inning and two more in the sixth.

In the fifth, Coulter doubled with two out, was wild pitched to second and scored on Suttemeier’s infield single; in the sixth, Gran led off with a homer, then Jeff Miller doubled and scored on Gilbert’s two-out single.

The Beavers threatened with two out in the bottom of the sixth inning when Darwin Barney doubled off the top of the leftfield fence and Ogata drew a walk.

Lissman then drove a pair of balls just foul outside the rightfield line before flying out to right to end the inning.

The Beavers’ game that had been scheduled for Tuesday against Portland has been cancelled.

OSU plays its final home series of the regular season next weekend against Arizona State with games Friday at 5:00 PM, Saturday at 1:00 PM and Sunday at 1:00 PM.

All three games can be heard on KEJO-AM (1240) in the Corvallis area, KUIK-AM (1360) in the Portland area, KKNX-AM (840) in the Eugene area and KICE-AM (940) in the Bend area.

The games can be heard in Spanish on the LaX Sports network.

Live audio and video is available via subscription on the internet through Beaver Nation Online at www.osubeavers.com. General admission tickets are available through www.osubeavers.com or by calling (800) GO BEAVS.

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