Beavers’ mantra now: ‘Yeah, let’s do it. Why not?’
AJ Hutcheson came on in relief to shut out the Gaels on three hits over five innings and keep the Beavers in the game (photo by Dominic Cusimano)
Updated 5/31/2025 10:08 AM, 4:35 PM
CORVALLIS — From the start of fall ball through the start of the postseason, Mitch Canham and his Oregon State players have talked about one goal: Getting to the College World Series and winning it all.
The road to Omaha just got a lot longer.
Unsung Saint Mary’s thrived in the underdog role, jumping on the Beavers early and hanging on for a 6-4 victory Friday night in the first round of the Corvallis Regional before a record Goss Stadium crowd of 4,339.
The No. 4 seed Gaels (36-24), who slipped into the NCAA Tournament by winning the WCC Tournament last weekend, took advantage of OSU starter Eric Segura’s ineffectiveness for three runs in the first inning and never looked back.
An upset, you say? Oregon State was No. 7 in the national RPI listings. Saint Mary’s was No. 90.
“One of the greatest games I have been a part of because of the energy, the setting, the crowd,” Saint Mary’s coach Eric Valenzuela said. “I am very proud of our boys.”
The No. 1 seed Beavers (41-13-1), who had gained a No. 8 national seed and are in position to play host to a Super Regional next weekend, now face long odds to make that happen.
Oregon State faces No. 2 seed Texas Christian (39-19) at noon Saturday in an elimination game. The Horned Frogs were hammered by No. 3 seed Southern Cal 13-1 in Friday’s early contest. If the Beavers survive, they will need to win three additional games over the next three days to advance to the Super Regional.
OSU coach Mitch Canham said he spoke with his players after Friday’s game and came to a conclusion.
“To make a statement and do something special at the end of it all … if it means going through and now needing to win all those other games?” Canham said at the end of a long soliloquy during the post-game press conference. “Sure, why not? That makes for a better story, for bigger memories. Now we get the opportunity to battle back and show everyone what we are really capable of doing.
“We have the right guys to do it. It’s baseball. If you lose a game, how do you rebound? Playing loose. Playing confident. … now that the first game is out of the way, we can re-set right there and go out and do what we’re supposed to do.”
Sounds good, but are the Beavers capable? Saint Mary’s pitchers Dylan Devecchio and Daniel Gueva Castro, both seniors, combined for 16 strikeouts in their nine innings of work. Every Beaver who picked up a bat struck out at least once.
“Sixteen punchees is unacceptable,” Canham acknowledged. “A lot of times those punchees happen from playing tight and missing our pitches early on. Can’t strike out on a two-strike count.”
Devecchio, a 6-foot, 185-pound left-hander, came in with a 6-3 record and a 4.85 ERA. He tamed the Beavers on seven hits with one walk and 10 strikeouts in 6 2/3 innings.
Castro, a 6-1, 190-pound right-hander, was even better, holding the Beavers hitless over the final 2 1/3 innings, getting six of his seven outs via the “K.”
“Castro came in after Dylan pitched his butt off and closed the door,” Valenzuela said.
They did it mostly with off-speed pitches that had the Beavers taking a lot of first-pitch strikes, flailing at pitches out of the zone and behind in the count most of the night.
I asked Devecchio if the game plan was to feed the Beavers a steady diet of curves and changeups.
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“That was the plan going in,” he nodded. “They are a good fastball hitting team.”
But not very good at hitting off-speed stuff — at least Friday night.
“We knew what we were getting into,” Canham said. “We had trained for it. We just did not execute.”
Segura, who took over the Friday night starting duties from Nelson Keljo late in the season, couldn’t get out of the first inning. The sophomore right-hander faced seven batters and threw 28 pitches. He got one out on a sacrifice bunt after Gaels first baseman Eddie Madrigal — cousin of ex-OSU standout Nick Madrigal — singled on the first pitch of the game. Segura yielded two hits, a walk and three hit batters. And then he was gone.
“Tough outing for Eric to not be able to fill up the zone,” Canham said. “He was just erratic today. It happened pretty quick. The runners were filling up the bases. You could tell from his body language he wasn’t feeling it.”
Segura was pulled with three runs in and the bases loaded with only one out.
AJ Hutcheson came on to put out the fire with a strikeout and a pop-out, but the Gaels batted around and took a 3-0 advantage.
“Getting a three-run lead early makes it a lot easier to go out there and pound the zone,” Devecchio said.
Hutcheson, a 5-11, 185-pound junior, was lights out for five innings, keeping the Beavers in the game. The sidewinder allowed three hits and no runs with one walk and five strikeouts, matching his career high with 53 pitches. Hutcheson departed in the sixth to a standing ovation from the Beaver faithful.
“Hutch did an amazing job,” Canham said.
Gavin Turley hammered a two-run homer to right field to bring Oregon State to within 3-2 in the third. It stayed that way until the seventh, after Laif Palmer came on for a tiring Hutcheson. Brian Duroff ripped a three-run homer to left to give the Gaels a 6-2 advantage. It was the first round-tripper Palmer has given up in 28 innings this season.
OSU third baseman Trent Caraway blasted a moon shot over the left-field wall for a solo homer in the bottom of the seventh to make it 6-3, and Easton Talt tripled home pinch-runner Dallas Macias for another run. The Beavers brought the tying run to the plate in Aiva Arquette, who struck out on three pitches to retire the side.
After that, Castro used his sidearm style to stymie the OSU hitters.
“Daniel is a great story,” Valenzuela said. “Early in season, we changed him from an overhand delivery to sidearm. I told him, ‘If you don’t want to do it, you’re not going to pitch. You haven’t had any success. We have to make a drastic adjustment with you. I believe you can do it.’
“And he picked it up within one week. He gradually has gotten better. Everything is more crisp. The slider is good, the changeup is good.”
The Beavers were the only team in the NCAA Tournament with a bye last weekend, due to their independent schedule. Did it make their hitters flat, or rusty?
“I don’t think the two weeks off was a negative at all,” Canham said. “We had our legs underneath us. Each guy last weekend (in three scrimmage sessions) had 10-plus at-bats, very competitive at-bats. Tonight was quite possibly a little bit of jitters from the postseason.”
Duroff summed up the game this way:
“We pounced on them early. Then (Hutcheson) came in and closed the door. He is a tough guy, kind of funky, and we weren’t used to it. But Dyl (Delvecchio) kept throwing zeroes. And once they went to the new guy (Palmer), we pounced on him.
“It got tight. The crowd got loud. But we are not afraid of anyone or any moment. It seems like our offense has come through more times than not. It is special to see. When the bats are humming, it is a fun game.”
Nothing was fun about Friday’s game to the Beavers. Now they must win an elimination game. And another. And another. And another.
Canham said he has faith.
‘I have been around these guys,” he said. “I have watched them battle. Right after you lose a game, what’s your response to it? We sat and talked about it. The first thing that came to mind was, ‘Yeah, let’s do it. Why not?’ The tradition of Oregon State is to always bounce back.”
“We have had a lot of bow-and-arrow moments this year, where we have something like this happen, and we shoot forward and learn from our mistakes and have a lot of success,” Turley said. “I hope that will happen. That is what I see with this team. It is nothing that hasn’t happened before this year.”
Well, not really. The Beavers haven’t had their backs to the wall like this before.
It will be about winning games, one at a time. It starts at noon Saturday against TCU.
Canham wouldn’t commit, but inferred that freshman right-hander Dax Whitney, the regular Saturday starter, will get the ball against the Trojans. It will be all hands on deck. The season is on the line. The bounce-back has to start somewhere, or it’s all over.
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