Box Score
MALIBU, CA�€"Grant Plumley (Lake Forest,
Calif.) belted a two-run home run in the bottom of the seventh as
Oral Roberts University rallied from a 4-0 deficit for a 6-4 win
over Washington State in the Pepperdine/YellowBook USA Classic,
Saturday at Eddy D. Field Stadium.
ORU (12-3) picked up
its ninth consecutive win, and is 2-0 in the YellowBook Classic
after also defeating No. 18 UC-Irvine on Friday. Washington State
(11-4) saw its six-game winning streak come to an end.
Trailing 4-0 entering
the bottom of the fifth, ORU finally reached Cougars starter Aaron
MacKenzie (3-1) for three runs. Nate Griffin (Tulsa, Okla.)
singled with one out and scored on Ryan Welborn's (Yukon,
Okla.) triple to leftfield, cutting the WSU lead to 4-1. Matt VanDerBosch
(Hastings, Minn.) followed
with single to left, scoring Welborn to put ORU within 4-2. Brian Hanson
(Kelseyville, Calif.) singled VanDerBosch to third, and later came
home on a wild pitch to get ORU within 4-3.
The score remained 4-3
until the bottom of the seventh. Griffin reached on an error
leading off the inning. Welborn sacrificed Griffin to second, and
Griffin scored two batters later on Hanson's RBI double. Plumley
then blasted his second homer of the season over the leftfield
wall, putting ORU on top 6-4 and chasing MacKenzie from the
game.
Justin Ramsey (Elk Grove,
Calif.), who entered the game with two outs in the seventh, faced a
bases loaded, one out jam in the top of the eighth but got out of
it when shortstop J.J. Burress grounded into an inning ending
double play.
Junior Dane Towery (Mustang,
Okla.) set down the Cougars in order in the ninth, getting a pair
of strikeouts and his first save.
Hanson, Plumley and
Welborn each had two hits for the Golden Eagles. Ramsey (1-0)
picked up his first win of the season. Starting pitcher Adam Lesko (Las
Vegas, Nev.) kept ORU in the game after allowing all four
Washington State runs in the fourth. Lesko went 6.0 innings and
allowed six hits while striking out four, retiring 10 of the last
12 batters he faced.
The Golden Eagles look
for the weekend sweep when they take on tournament host Pepperdine,
4 p.m. CST, Sunday.
--ORU--
