NCAA baseball: Stanford stays alive, forces decisive game vs. Texas A&M

The Stanford baseball team made a habit last season of playing at its best whenever it mattered most. The Cardinal are showing that same tendency again this year. Top-seeded Stanford won two elimination games on its home field Sunday, including a 13-5 victory over Texas A&M in the nightcap, and is now one win away from advancing to the Super Regionals of the NCAA Division I tournament for the second straight year.

Stanford and Texas A&M play again in a winner-take-all game Monday at 6 p. m. Including 2022, the Cardinal are now 7-0 in Regional and Super Regional games in which they’ve faced elimination.

Sunday against the Aggies, the Cardinal was up 6-5 when Alberto Rios kicked off a seven-run inning with an RBI double that scored Braden Montgomery. Malcolm Moore then hit a two-run homer with no outs before Tommy Troy had a three-run blast with one out to give Stanford a 13-5 lead. Montgomery, Nick Dugan, and Brandt Pancer combined to allow just one earned run in 8 1/3 innings of relief after starter Ty Uber allowed four earned runs in two-thirds of an inning.

Last season, after winning the Pac-12 tournament title, Stanford won three straight elimination games in its own regional to advance. In the best-of-three Super Regional against UConn, host Stanford lost the first game before coming back to win the next two to advance to the College World Series. In Stanford’s 6-5 win over Cal St.

Fullerton 6-5 on Sunday afternoon in its first elimination game, Temo Becerra’s two-run home run in the top of the sixth inning proved to be the difference. Maddox Latta singled home a run in the first and Cole Urman belted a solo home run in the second to stake Cal State Fullerton to a 2-0 lead, but Troy put the Cardinal in front with a three-run homer in the third. The Titans grabbed the lead in the fourth when Nate Nankil doubled to deep right-center field to plate Jack Haley.

After Becerra put Stanford in the lead for the final time, Drew Dowd and Ryan Bruno pitched the final three scoreless innings to preserve the win. Nick Dugan (1-0) allowed one run on 3 ⅔ innings of relief and earned the win. Bruno earned his ninth save.

The three runs the Broncos scored in the bottom of the sixth inning was all the offense they could muster in a season-ending loss to the Razorbacks at the Fayetteville Regional. Santa Clara, trailing 4-0, got a two-RBI double from catcher Eamonn Lance, who later scored on an Arkansas throwing error to cut the Razorbacks’ lead to one. But the Broncos were unable to add any more runs, as Arkansas reliever Will McEntire threw 2 2/3 innings of scoreless relief before Hunter Hollan got the final out in the ninth inning.

Thomas Ferroggiaro also had an RBI for Santa Clara, which was coming off a 9-3 win over Arizona on Saturday in another elimination game. Santa Clara starter Brandon Gomez struck out six and allowed three earned runs as Arkansas had a 4-0 lead after four. The Broncos, who won the West Coast Conference tournament championship, finished the season at 36-20, a marked improvement over the 24-29 record they had last year.

.