For the first three innings Friday night, it seemed as if the Oregon baseball team would keep pace with Cal State Fullerton’s 2013 All-American Thomas Eshelman. Eshelman, as a freshman, struck out 83 while walking just 3 batters last season. He would be just as dominant Friday against the Ducks, not allowing a baserunner until the fourth inning and halting any sort of Oregon offense, leading Fullerton to a 9-2 win.
Tommy Thorpe was on the mound for the Ducks and pitched well in the beginning of the game. But his good start was stained in the fourth inning when a walk and three straight singles started a Titans rally. With two outs, third baseman Matt Chapman made a statement, hitting a three-run home run to left field.
“The first two innings went well and then the third inning went sideways a little bit and the fourth inning really went sideways,” Thorpe said. “Nothing I can really do, I can only control what I can control.”
Thorpe retired the next batter, but the damage was done.
“It kinda got out of hand in that one inning,” redshirt junior Kyle Garlick said. “They put up a five spot and pounded us in the ground after that.”
In the following two innings, the Titans would add to their lead, tacking on one run in the fifth. In the sixth, Darrell Hunter took the mound with no runners on and two outs, but the Titans continued to pour it on the Ducks. The inning was set up by a Chapman double down the left field line putting runners on second and third for J.D. Davis. Davis then singled to right field, scoring both Titans. At the end of the inning, the score was 9-0.
The Oregon offense wasn’t a factor in the game due to Eshelman’s control. The Ducks picked up their first hit and baserunner when freshman Austin Grebeck connected for a single to left in the fourth inning. He would be left on base, as Eshelman retired the remaining two batters to end the inning. It wouldn’t be until the sixth that the Ducks would get another hit when Mark Karaviotis pinch-hit for shortstop Kevin Minjares.
“(Eshelman has) great command in the strike zone when he wants and great command out of the strike zone out when he wants,” head coach George Horton said. “There’s some slipperiness to him. It’s hard to describe.”
In the ninth, with Miles Chambers on the mound, the Ducks managed a two-out rally with a walk and a Tolman ground-rule double. They would come in to score on a Kyle Garlick double to left center. But that is all the offense the Ducks would manufacture.
Coming into the game, Thorpe had a 1.38 ERA and eight strikeouts in 13.0 innings of work. But when he got in trouble, he couldn’t find a way to get out. Thorpe (1-1, 3.93 ERA) would pick up the loss for the game pitching, 5.1 innings surrendering seven runs (six earned) with three strikeouts and 3 walks. But it wasn’t just all on Thorpe.
“I don’t think Thorpe was awful,” Horton said. “I think that they kicked out rear ends… We got beat in a lot of different ways and they out coached us as well.”
The Titans finished with 14 hits and didn’t produce an error defensively.
Eshelman (2-0, 1.50 ERA) led the Titans, pitching eight innings, striking out seven and allowing just two hits and one walk.
The Ducks are now 8-1 on the season and will have their freshman Matt Krook on the mound Saturday looking to even the series.
“That sets up as a pretty intriguing thing to see Matt Krook, who has been very poised, against a team that popped our lip and bloodied our noses,” Horton said.
Follow Andrew Bantly on Twitter @abant3