(Photo: Brady Klain/WCSN)
Arizona State head coach Tracy Smith has been patiently waiting and predicting that his team was bound to turn a corner sooner or later in 2018. If this weekend against the Oregon Ducks was any indication, Smith’s players have jumped around the corner.
After a thrilling come-from-behind win on Friday night followed by an 18-run outburst on Saturday, the Sun Devils wrapped up their Pac-12 opening series on Sunday afternoon with a 6-1 victory over the Ducks, clinching the series sweep.
“What we want to pound into the heads of the guys in that locker room is, ‘This is us, this isn’t a fluke,'” Smith said post-game. “If we strap it on and compete and play good baseball like we’re supposed to, I feel like we’re pretty tough to beat.”
After freshman right-hander Boyd Vander Kooi was moved up to the Saturday spot in the rotation this weekend, Smith handed the ball to perhaps the pitcher on his staff he trusts the most, senior left-hander Eli Lingos.
Lingos (3-1) proceeded to dominate the Ducks over 7.2 innings, allowing just one earned run on five hits while striking out four.
The Temecula, California native was able to wiggle out of trouble in the top of the first when errors by Carter Aldrete in right field and Drew Swift at shortstop put two runners in scoring position, and from there was in control for the rest of the afternoon.
Smith believes that being able to get out of that jam was a huge step forward for his young’s team growth.
“What was nice about that, even though I’m not happy with the errors, is we didn’t collapse after that,” Smith said. “We found a way to get out of it, which shows growth because we didn’t get caught up in the moment, and let that thing snowball… that to me is the difference, is we’re just playing like a more experienced team.”
The Sun Devils were able to jump out to a first-inning lead for the third straight game against the Ducks thanks in large part to center fielder Gage Canning, who led off with a single and came around to score on an Aldrete single three batters later.
Canning finished the day 2-4 with a double and a run, wrapping up a white-hot weekend against Duck pitching that saw him record 10 hits in 13 at-bats with seven RBI and five extra-base hits.
“Watching Gage, he’s on another planet right now. The guy’s the best baseball player, ever,” Aldrete said tongue-in-cheek post-game. “It’s so fun to watch him play.”
The Sun Devils would tack on two more runs in the third inning on RBI hits from Aldrete and Taylor Lane, getting the start at DH after launching his first home run of the season on Saturday night. Another run in the fourth courtesy of a Drew Swift sacrifice bunt, followed by two more in the fifth off the bats of Gage Workman and Alika Williams would be more than enough with the way Lingos was dealing.
After Lingos departed with one man on and two out in the eighth, Smith handed the ball to redshirt freshman Zane Strand, making his second appearance of the season following Tommy John surgery in early 2017.
The right-hander faced two batters while throwing nine pitches to record the final out of the frame, which is encouraging for Smith on multiple levels.
“I like what I’m seeing. He’s in the strike zone, his first outing I thought he was a little timid with the breaking pitch, but today he threw some really good breaking pitches,” Smith said. “He’s going to be a valuable piece for us as we get into this thing. He’s worked hard to get to this point.”
Anyone associated with ASU baseball for the first month of the season has been emphasizing that this team would be poised to do something special once the younger players figured out how to have success at the college level.
Moving ahead to a non-conference matchup with UNLV on Tuesday before heading to UCLA next weekend for their first Pac-12 road series, Lingos firmly believes that this weekend against Oregon bodes great things moving forward.
“You can’t get too high or too low at any time, so it’s more of just trying to use that momentum and just building with it.” Lingos said. “It’s just that feeling of, ‘Clearly we can do this.’ We’ve faced some really good pitchers, we’ve faced some good hitters, and people got it done on both sides, offensively and defensively. Knowing that you belong here and that you can excel in the [Pac-12] is really good for a lot of these guys.”
