(Photo: Nicholas Badders/WCSN)
When Sam Ferri launched a towering fly ball down the left-field line in the seventh inning, all 4,079 in attendance stood up and gasped, waiting to see if the ball would be fair or foul. The ball ended up being just foul as it landed into the bleachers and about fifteen feet short of the wall. It was quite the crowd teaser.
“I didn’t feel like I got that one that well,” Ferri said. “If it was fair, it would have been an out anyways, so I’m kind of happy it went foul.”
He indeed was fortunate that ball went foul. Ferri would eventually fight off a high-inside fastball through the left side for an RBI single, tying up the game 5-5 at the time.
It wasn’t until Ferri’s next at-bat in the ninth inning when he received a similar pitch up and in, and this time, he absolutely unloaded. This time the ball didn’t go foul. It went way over the left-field wall, and it won ASU the game.
“I knew they were going to throw me a fastball in,” Ferri said. “That’s a pitch I’ve been struggling with, especially on [Friday]. It was kind of the same pitch I hit the base hit earlier except it was a little lower. I saw it in and I just hit it hard.”
In what was quite the back-and-forth contest between Arizona State and Washington State, the Devils walked it off over the Cougars on Saturday night as Ferri crushed his first collegiate home run to give the Sun Devils an 8-7 win and it improved the Devils undefeated record to 18-0.
Despite the exciting way to end the ballgame, ASU head coach Tracy Smith knew his team didn’t play exceptionally well and probably could have made the victory a lot more easier on the team had they been cleaner on pitching and hitting .
“We gave a lot of free bases tonight and gave away some at-bats,” Smith said. “The positive piece to that is that we found a way to grind one out and win ugly.”
ASU’s pitchers only walked four hitters for the whole night, but shortstop Alika Williams committed a costly error in the ninth inning with one out that allowed Washington State to stay alive and eventually score the tying run.
After home runs by Spencer Torkelson and Gage Workman in the first and second innings, respectively, the Cougars put up a three-spot on starter Boyd Vander Kooi in the fourth. Vander Kooi did not allow a hit in the first three innings, but despite some struggles in the fourth, he settled in nicely and finished his outing throwing 6.1 innings, allowing four earned runs, six hits, two walks, and four strikeouts in a no-decision.
“He competed,” Smith said. “We minimized the damage if you will. Those innings could have gotten way out of hand and I thought our guys did a great job of remaining composed and taking outs. One of our sayings for our pitchers is your job is to ‘keep the opposition from scoring even after they have scored.’ I thought he did a pretty good job of that tonight.”
Smith also noted the importance of Dusty Garcia in the seventh inning that allowed ASU to tie the game at five and get ASU back in the game after Washington State took the lead in the seventh 5-4. After a Myles Denson single, Smith inserted Garcia as a pinch runner, who proceeded to steal second, advance to third on a wild pitch, and eventually score on Ferri’s single.
“The heads up baserunning honestly led us to our win tonight,” Smith said. “If he’s not doing that and moving up on the [wild pitch], we may not be in a position to hit the go-ahead in the ninth.”
A Hunter Bishop two-run single in the seventh gave the Devils a 7-5 lead at the end of the inning. But the Cougars clawed their way back as they got a run in the eighth and eventually brought home a run in the ninth to tie the game 7-7.
Besides the Williams error, the Devils defense was stellar Saturday night. After recording three double plays on Friday night, they recorded three more on Saturday night. None was arguably bigger than when Washington State had runners on the corners with one out in the top of the ninth only for Andres Alvarez to lineout to second baseman Carter Aldrete, who then doubled off the runner at first to end the side and keep the game tied.
“I think we are a lot better defensive team than in the past,” Aldrete said. “I’m trying to do my part but Alika, Workman, and Torkelson have gotten so much better in one year–the maturity. Shoutout to them for working hard all season.”
Arizona State will look to sweep the Cougars on Sunday afternoon. RJ Dabovich will take the hill with first pitch scheduled for 12:00 p.m MST at Phoenix Muni.
