ASU Baseball: Mental errors, strong pitching performance doom Sun Devils in game two against No. 4 Stanford

(Photo: Karli Matthias/WCSN)

One night after some late-inning heroics led Arizona State baseball (37-16, 16-12 Pac-12) to a ninth-inning come-from-behind win over the No. 4 Stanford Cardinal (40-11, 21-7 Pac-12), the biggest spark at Phoenix Municipal Stadium came from the post-game fireworks show rather than the Sun Devil bats.

Cardinal starter Will Matthiessen was perfect through five frames and drove in three runs batting in the cleanup spot, paving the way for a bounce back 6-4 win over the Sun Devils.

Matthiessen (W, 6-2) was the definition of efficient Friday night against the Devils, striking out six while surrendering just two hits and one earned run, in addition to not allowing a walk.

“Matthiessen was beating us a couple different ways,” Sun Devil head coach Tracy Smith said. “I didn’t think we were real competitive offensively early in the game, and when you’re going against a good pitcher, a good opponent, you can’t give at-bats away… We kinda said in the dugout, ‘He’s good but he’s not that good,’ to be mowing through our lineup like that.”

With Smith opting to get Vander Kooi back on his regular throwing schedule after having his start against California last week pushed to Sunday because of a rainout, Corrigan (L, 3-4) was handed the ball to start for the second time this season in 28 appearances.

The sophomore right-hander took the opportunity and ran with it, throwing four perfect frames to match Matthiessen, finishing the night allowing three runs on four hits while striking out a career-high eight in 5.2 innings.

“Anytime you start a game and you can kinda get into a good rhythm, obviously I was in the windup until the fifth or sixth inning,” Corrigan said. “That just gets you a good flow in the game, it’s just pitch after pitch and good sequencing with the catchers, so it definitely is an advantage.”

“We honestly were probably thinking three-to-five innings depending on how [Corrigan] did,” Smith said. “But {Mattheissen] was throwing well and the horns were locked up in that game… I’m proud of [Corrigan] for stepping in there and doing that.”

One night after erasing a three-run deficit in the ninth inning to walk off the Cardinal, the Sun Devils found themselves down three with eight outs to spare instead of three in the seventh. After a Lyle Lin solo home run pulled the Sun Devils to within 5-2, back-to-back walks to Gage Workman and Carter Aldrete put pinch-hitter Cole Austin at the dish as the potential tying run.

After Austin swung through a 2-1 slider from Zach Grech, Cardinal catcher Maverick Handley fired down to first base and caught Aldrete too far off the bag on a bang-bang play that prompted a discussion between Smith and first base umpire Jake Uhlenhopp. With two outs and now just a runner on second, Austin struck out swinging on the next pitch to end the threat.

“Regardless of out or safe on the pickoff, the point that we try to make with the guys is…it doesn’t matter, there can’t be a play there,” Smith said. “We got the tying run at the plate, we gotta be smarter than that. If we learn from that then we’ll take it, but I guess I’m disappointed, not that we would’ve gotten those runs in, but I say this all the time, you want to put yourself at least in the position to see if you can.”

The Aldrete pickoff seemed to doom ASU on this night, and though they attempted to stage another ninth-inning miracle with a two-out, two-run home run by Workman to cut a 6-2 deficit down to 6-4, Grech nailed the door shut on a potential series sweep for ASU with an eight-out save.

What started out as a three-and-a-half month journey back on February 15 against Notre Dame is now down to one game with Arizona State seemingly all but locked in to a return to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2016.

With Stanford still in a position to potentially host a regional, Arizona State will look to have its shorthanded roster at full strength come next weekend, and the game on Saturday afternoon seems to have less of the intensity of a typical conference matchup.

Nevertheless, the Sun Devils will be looking for their first series win of the season against a top-5 team in three tries, and one more chance to bolster the confidence that has been a calling card of this team since day one.

“We’re never out of any game,” Workman said. “There’s not a team that would come out here that I would be like, ‘Oh we can’t beat this team.’ With the guys we have on our staff and our offense and defense, if we play how we play there’s no one that can beat us.”