June 22, 2007

Beavers will defend title
OSU will face either North Carolina or Rice in final series

By WIRE REPORTS

OMAHA, Neb. -- Daniel Turpen allowed five hits over eight innings and defending champion Oregon State beat UC Irvine 7-1 in the College World Series on Wednesday night, ending the Anteaters' dramatic postseason run.

The win sends the Beavers (47-18) into the best-of-three championship series starting Saturday.

Turpen (10-1) turned in the third straight strong performance by an Oregon State starter, not allowing a hit after the fourth inning. Joe Paterson pitched a perfect ninth.

The route to the championship series was much smoother this year. In 2006, the Beavers lost their CWS opener to Miami 11-1, then staved off elimination for four straight games to reach the finals.

Mitch Canham hit a two-run homer, Darwin Barney had two RBI singles and John Wallace added a run-scoring triple for the Beavers, who scored four unearned runs in the third inning.

It was a disappointing finish for the Anteaters (47-17-1), who reinstated their baseball program in 2002 and were making their first CWS appearance.

The Anteaters captured the hearts of local fans by rebounding from an opening loss to Arizona State to win extra-inning games against Cal State Fullerton and Arizona State in their final at-bats.

The 13-inning win over Fullerton took 5 hours, 40 minutes, the longest game in CWS history. The 10-inning win over ASU came after the Anteaters rallied from four runs down in the eighth to win in their last at-bat for the third time in four games.

Ollie Linton, who drove in the winning run Tuesday night, flied out to end the game. As the Beavers held a subdued celebration on the infield, UC Irvine players leaned against their dugout rail staring.

Bryan Petersen cried as teammate Wes Etheridge put his arm around him to console him. After a team meeting in right field, players and coaches hugged.

With his pitchers getting extended work the previous two games, Anteaters coach Dave Serrano chose freshman Christian Bergman to start.

Bergman (4-4) made two starts in the regular season, never going more than three innings.

He held the Beavers scoreless through 2 2-3 innings and was on the verge of getting out of the third when Mike Lissman grounded to third baseman Tyler Vaughn.

Vaughn threw high, and first baseman Taylor Holiday missed a sweep tag on Lissman. Chris Hopkins came home from second on the play for the first of the Beavers' four unearned runs.