Baseball

ASU’s Pitching Staff Bends, But Doesn’t Break in Game 2 Victory Over Omaha

PHOENIX — When glancing at the box score and the stat sheet following Saturday’s contest, nothing seems too out of the ordinary. The 3,188 seated at Phoenix Municipal Stadium witnessed a second consecutive victory by a healthy margin to clinch the opening series of the 2026 season.

However, those in attendance also saw a turbulent outing from Arizona State baseball’s (2-0) pitching staff for nine frames of dancing through the raindrops yet avoiding the worst of the storm to hold onto an 11-5 win over Omaha (0-2).

“It’s tough to scoff at a win by six, but that game was a lot closer than that,” head coach Willie Bloomquist said. “There were a lot of different momentum shifts within that game. We were, in my mind, a little sloppy top to bottom.”

After missing the entire 2025 season due to injury, redshirt junior right-handed pitcher Collin Linder held his own in his first-ever start on the mound as a Sun Devil. He hummed right along in the first two innings, inducing weak contact four times while only surrendering a single and a walk.

Linder’s third time strolling up to the bump was when things began to get a bit hairy. A pop out right into his glove and a strikeout put him one out away from making up for a leadoff hit-by-pitch, but the Mavericks rattled off two straight base hits to tie the game up at one run apiece.

A wild pitch on a full-count to issue a walk the very next-bat meant the righty had his first major challenge of the season with a two-out, bases-loaded situation. All he needed was four pitches to force a groundout to second base and escape the jam.

“I think everything felt good,” Linder said. “Obviously could have located some things better, but everything felt good. I felt at home on the mound again, which is nice.”

Linder pitched more innings of scoreless ball before being pulled ahead of the fifth to finish with three strikeouts, four hits against and one earned run. By the time he walked off the bump for the final time, the men behind him had sported him six runs in support in the batter’s box.

“It’s a weight off your chest when you have guys putting up five, six runs in an inning behind you,” Linder said. “It puts you at ease a little bit on the mound, just knowing that even if you give up a one-spot, you got guys behind you that are going to smoke the balls and score runs, and it’s great.”

Junior right-hander Josh Butler was the first arm out of the bullpen, and also fell victim to a roller-coaster of an appearance.

The Phoenix native emulated Linder by collecting two groundouts and a flyout to start before allowing Omaha’s bottom of the order to notch a walk, single, and an RBI sacrifice fly in the top of the sixth. He’d pick up one more out until another hit allowed led to Bloomquist bringing in senior left-hander Sean Fitzpatrick, who executed a lefty-on-lefty matchup to perfection with three straight strikes.

Innings seven saw perhaps the most volatility of the entire contest on account of junior right-hander Wyatt Halvorson. His first frame alone saw a leadoff hit, two straight outs, and two more runners take a base from a walk and a hit-by-pitch that were ultimately stranded on a putout in foul territory.

“I think (Fitzpatrick) did a great job coming in and putting the fire out there,” Bloomquist said. “But we pitched ourselves into unnecessary trouble a few times. Just weren’t as sharp as I’d like us to see and with things we gotta get better on. (Butler) was okay, wasn’t as sharp as he’s been in the past. (Halvorson), I mean man he had some electric stuff, but we’ve got to continue to put pitches together and finish at-bats.”

A smoother top of eighth from Halvorson alongside an 11-2 advantage made Bloomquist comfortable enough to send out freshman right-hander Austin Musso to perform closing duties.

A miscommunication within the infield allowed a ball to drop and a runner to go to second set the tone for the Illinois native’s debut. The Mavericks’ heart of the order made contact three consecutive at-bats for two RBI singles and an RBI triple prior to Musso regaining control and striking out the final two batters.

“That, to me, was what was disappointing, is you’ve got a kid in there who’s gonna be a heck of an arm for us moving forward, a chance to give him some confidence right out of the gates and we botch it,” Bloomquist said.

Despite the overwhelming positives that come with starting the season 2-0, game two represented a learning moment for the Sun Devils’ pitching staff. 54 regular season contests still remain on ASU’s schedule, and the team’s collection of arms will have plenty of chances to find their stride as one whole unit.

“Every time we started kind of getting a nice lead, we would somehow put two or three guys on base and make it interesting,” Bloomquist said. “You can’t keep doing that and living dangerously. You’re gonna get burned at some point in time, so that’s something we addressed.”