COLLEGE STATION, Texas — The Oregon baseball team's season came to an end Sunday with a 15-9 loss to No. 3 Texas A&M in game two of their best-of-three NCAA Super Regional series at Blue Bell Park. The Ducks (40-20) jumped out to an 8-4 lead through six innings, helped by back-to-back-to-back homers in the first. But the game unraveled in the seventh, when the Aggies sent 13 batters to the plate and scored nine runs on just two hits — the second a grand slam. Mason Neville, Dominic Hellman and Drew Smith each had three hits for the Ducks, and Hellman and Smith each homered — Smith's coming during Oregon's run of three straight in the first, between homers from Chase Meggers and Anson Aroz. But the UO pitching staff walked nine hitters for the second day in a row, seven of those coming in the decisive seventh inning.
"We gave it our best shot," UO coach Mark Wasikowski said. "We came up short, and we're not disappointed about it whatsoever. Very proud of the effort these guys made. We came into a really tough environment and obviously we have a formidable ball club that was ready to play. We came up a tick short, but we're excited about our future." Oregon still can celebrate a season in which the Ducks were in the thick of the Pac-12 Conference race to the very end, and made a second straight NCAA Super Regional appearance for the first time in program history.
"I remember coming in my freshman year and it felt like there was a lot of doubt and uncertainty in the program," UO pitcher RJ Gordon said. "We didn't know postseason baseball. Knowing after my fourth year it's not that way anymore, and we expect to be in these situations and we expect to be the team that wins this thing, unfortunately that didn't work out that way this year but this program's going to be in Omaha and I have no doubt about that."
How It Happened: Texas A&M was the designated visiting team Sunday, and the Aggies got one run in the first off UO starter Grayson Grinsell. But the Ducks answered quickly — after a one-out single by Hellman in the bottom of the inning, Meggers, Smith and Aroz went back-to-back-to-back and Oregon had a 4-1 lead.
Grinsell pitched a 1-2-3 second, and the Ducks executed a double steal in the bottom of the inning that brought Bryce Boettcher home for a 5-1 lead. A two-out RBI single in the third got Texas A&M within 5-2, but in the bottom of the inning Smith scored on an error and Carter Garate drove in Aroz with a base hit for a 7-2 lead.
The Aggies responded with two in the fourth off Grinsell, and his day ended after a leadoff single in the fifth. Brock Moore came on and retired the next two hitters, the second on a double play to end the inning.
Moore faced the minimum in the sixth with help from another double play, and the Ducks made it 8-4 in the bottom of the inning on an RBI single from Hellman. But then came the top of the seventh.
A walk, a single and a one-out walk loaded the bases, and another walk forced in a run. Moore struck out the next hitter for the second out, but the next three hitters reached on free bases — two more walks and a hit batter. Jaxon Jordan entered and walked in the go-ahead run, before surrendering a grand slam that made it 13-8.
"I just lost my front side a little bit, couldn't slow myself down and was leaving balls away," Moore said. "I wish I could go back and change it, but what happened, happened. I apologize to all my teammates, but I gave everything I had."
Turner Spoljaric came in to end the inning, but he gave up a two-run homer in the eighth. Hellman hit a towering homer in the bottom of the inning and Cole Stokes pitched a scoreless top of the ninth, but the Ducks could get no closer.
Aroz finished the Super Regional 4-for-8 with two homers, four RBIs and four runs. Meggers was 3-for-9 with four RBIs and two extra-base hits. Neville was 4-for-7 with two runs scored, and Garate had three hits across the two games.
