After a long midweek layoff in light of bad weather, Stanford baseball hosts Arizona tonight to kick off a three-game set that could help either squad break from the middle of the Pac-10.
The No. 25 Cardinal (28-18, 10-11 Pac-10) sits a game behind the No. 27 Wildcats (32-17, 11-10) for fifth in the conference, hoping to find its rhythm after a tough series loss to Oregon last weekend. On the tail end of a six-game win-streak, Stanford dropped two of three to the Ducks before its Tuesday game against San Francisco was canceled due to rain.
Stanford had been nearly perfect in midweek games with an 11-1 record, so the squad will have to find new ways to get back its winning touch.
“I don’t think it’s going to throw us off any kind of rhythm,” said junior reliever A.J. Talt. “We had a tough series against Oregon, but I don’t think that an extra day is going to have a big effect on this weekend at all.”
The Cardinal has been hovering near the periphery of the national rankings due to mid-season struggles, but with only two weeks left, Stanford can still finish first—or last—in the wide-open Pac-10.
Ascending to the conference championship will be a stretch, requiring (among other things) a 6-0 finish for the Cardinal and an 0-6 finish for frontrunner Oregon State, which is ranked second in the country and without a series loss on the season. But Stanford closes the regular season with series against the two teams it has the best chance to leapfrog: Arizona and fourth-place Cal, a squad that’s only two games ahead of the Cardinal. Also looking to move up is USC, currently sharing the sixth spot with Stanford despite a troubling 10-16 record outside of conference play.
At any rate, the Pac-10 is bound to have a tight finish for a second consecutive year. In 2010, only four games separated the third and ninth place teams, with Stanford landing in fourth and eight teams moving on to the postseason. Due to its relative competitiveness, the Pac-10 will likely send teams to the NCAA Tournament with conference records below .500, but the Cardinal still needs to finish strongly—the one-game difference between eighth and ninth place kept Washington out of a regional last season.
A series win this weekend would secure at least an eighth-place finish for Stanford. Though the Cardinal has won seven of its last nine games, the Wildcats are on an even hotter run, taking eight of nine while outscoring opponents by a combined score of 86-29.
Stanford’s pitching staff has one of its toughest tasks of the season ahead of it. Last weekend in Eugene, Cardinal hurlers never gave up more than two runs in an inning, but the Ducks found hitting throughout their order and were able to score 20 times in the series.
“I think we just [need to] concentrate on the basics,” Talt said. “[Pitching coach Rusty] Filter is always talking to the pitchers about getting the first guy out of every inning…simple goals are much easier to accomplish, so we shouldn’t try to complicate things and think too much.”
Arizona’s lineup will be just as formidable as Oregon’s, if not more so. Leading the Pac-10 in hitting at .326, Arizona has scored in the double digits 18 times this season. The Wildcats’ top five batters are all hitting better than .333 and have each started in all of Arizona’s 49 games.
That’s a far cry from Stanford’s offensive weaponry, which has been juggled all year in hopes of finding consistency at the plate. Only sophomore third baseman Stephen Piscotty and senior catcher Zach Jones have appeared in every contest for the Cardinal, and Piscotty’s .365 batting average is the only mark above .320 amongst Stanford starters. Emerging as another source of firepower has been sophomore centerfielder Tyler Gaffney, who led Stanford with seven hits against Oregon last weekend and is second only to Piscotty with a .418 on-base percentage.
But runs will be at a premium for the Cardinal in this series thanks to an Arizona rotation that deserves much of the credit for the Wildcats’ recent success. After his fourth complete game of the year last Saturday against Washington State, junior Kyle Simon was named Pac-10 Pitcher of the Week. Simon and Friday starter sophomore Kurt Heyer both boast ERAs below 2.75, a mark equaled by no Stanford pitchers who have made more than five appearances.
Despite Arizona’s edge on paper, Stanford has the upper hand in at least one key area: home-field advantage. The Cardinal is 16-5 at Sunken Diamond this year, while the Wildcats are just 8-11 on the road.
Tonight’s 5:30 p.m. start at Sunken Diamond will be followed by two 1:00 p.m. matinees on Saturday and Sunday.