In the first game of the regionals, the Michigan State Spartans played the Pepperdine Waves.

Pepperdine struck first, scoring two runs in the 3rd. Michigan State got on the board in the 5th thanks to a Jordan Keur base hit, and they cut the lead in half.

However, the lead would become too insurmountable for them when Pepperdine opened the gates of runs. In the bottom of the 6th, the Waves batted around and scored four runs to make it 6-1.

Michigan State would score one more run in the 7th, but that was all. Pepperdine’s Jon Moscot threw a complete game, allowing 10 hits, 2 runs, 2 walks, and struck out 4 for the win.

The Fresno State Bulldogs played the Stanford Cardinal in the second game of the night. » Continue reading “Palo Alto Regional: Day One”

Members of the Cardinal team celebrate Austin Wilson's walkoff home run. (Photo: Mac)

The weather cooperated with baseball for once this weekend in the Bay Area.

Saturday’s game against the University of Southern California Trojans was rained out and a doubleheader was scheduled for Sunday, Mar 25.

The series marks No. 3 Stanford’s first meeting with a Pac-12 team this season.

» Continue reading “Stanford Sweeps Double Header Against USC”

Getting the obvious out of the way: Mark Appel had a pretty line last night.

Even better? He was throwing a no-hitter into the fifth inning.

In short: Appel be beastin’.

Also, offense is good. This offense should stay like this. Scoring runs is good.

It’s two games into the college baseball season and Stanford’s bats have been on absolute fire. Yesterday, there were lots of homers – three of them, including an inside-the-parker from Eric Smith (Stanford’s first since Cord Phelps did it against Texas in 2008). Stanford won 8-3, with Mark Appel going seven innings and giving up a run on two hits.

Here is my dramatic reenactment of this game.

Stanford’s offense:

Vanderbilt’s defense/various baseballs hit by Stanford’s offense/etc.:

File from GIFSoup.com.

I’m a good writer, guys.

As I write this, it’s the bottom of the seventh in game two, and Stanford is again up on Vanderbilt by a lot, this time 9-3. My favorite pitcher, Brett Mooneyham, went six innings and racked up eight strikeouts. Stanford is still firing on all cylinders, and I absolutely love it, especially given that Vanderbilt has a great track record of its own and is ranked 10th nationally. (We’re ranked 2nd nationally, but whatever. Vanderbilt’s a good team and you can’t overestimate your enemies.)

I really, really like the look of this team this year. A full recap of this game – game two – will come later, once it’s actually over, but for now I just wanted to point out that I like what I’m seeing from these guys. They’re hungry, offensively potent, and they know how to pitch. Color me impressed, boys.

I guessed all three. You can probably guess them, too, if you’ve been paying even the slightest amount of attention to this team.

If you don’t feel like guessing, it’s Mark Appel, Kenny Diekroeger, and Stephen Piscotty. Shocker.

Anyways, check the Golden Spikes Award’s official website out here and read the press release for the full list of student-athletes. Florida has the most on there – seven total – but several schools, including Stanford, follow that up with three candidates of their own.

Now let’s try to win this award! Season starts tomorrow – thankfully – so we’ll have stuff to talk about!

Stanford now has three Preseason All-Americans. Check out this press release!

TUCSON, Ariz.– Stanford Baseball added to its preseason resume on Tuesday when Collegiate Baseball named righthander Mark Appel to its first team and infielder Kenny Diekroeger to its second team.

Third baseman Stephen Piscotty was named a first team preseason All-American by the National’s Collegiate Baseball Writers earlier this month.

All three preseason All-Americans hail from the Bay Area, Diekroeger prepped at Menlo School in Woodside, while East Bay natives, Appel and Piscotty, played at Monte Vista and Amador Valley High.

Appel as the team’s No. 1 starter a year ago was 6-7 with a 3.02 ERA over 110.1 innings. He is projected as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2012 June Draft. Also a potential first round pick, Diekroeger hit .293 with 31 runs and 31 RBIs as the team’s shortstop. As a freshman third baseman he hit a team-best .356 and carries a .324 career average into the season.

On Monday, Collegiate Baseball rated Stanford No. 3 nationally in its preseason poll. Stanford opens the season February 17-19 with Vanderbilt. Texas and Rice are also on the pre-conference home schedule in February and March. Tickets are available at 1-800-STANFORD.

Other Pac-12 members of Collegiate Baseball’s preseason team include: Deven Marrero (1st team, Arizona State), Brady Rodgers (2nd, ASU), Tony Renda (2nd, Cal), Kurt Heyer (3rd, Arizona), Adam Plutko (3rd, UCLA), Tony Bryant (3rd, Oregon State), Shaun Cooper (3rd, Utah).

I think that’s pretty darn awesome.

Also, if you know where the title comes from for this quick hit, you get a cookie.

Mark is cooler than you, even though he goes to a nerdy school.

We have three! Three! And one of them is the projected number one pick!

Mark Appel, as predicted, is the first choice to go to the Astros next June. I’ve already congratulated ‘Stros writer Terri Schlather just in case she gets him, because he’s hard to beat. He’d be able to work with fellow Cardinal Jason Castro in Houston, too. I’m a huge battery fan (don’t get me started on it), so having a battery that can communicate intellectually as well as emotionally – that’s a real winner.

Anyway, let’s not get carried away. I’d love to see Mark go first overall – with Andrew Luck probably going first in the NFL, as well, we’d have two first overall picks in drafts if this goes down. I don’t think we’ve ever had a first overall pick in baseball. This is really exciting, actually.

Mark isn’t the only player on the list, either. Kenny Diekroeger landed the 21st overall spot, and Stephen Piscotty is at number 37. The Class of 2013 is insanely talented, people. I wouldn’t take my eyes off them if I were you. We’re definitely going to Omaha this year, at least. I can’t see us being stopped.

And hey, everyone on this team will also succeed in life. A degree from Stanford goes a long way.

Stanford just lost 5-2 to UNC.

UNC’s staff ace, Patrick Johnson, held us off until the eighth. Then, with two outs and two men on, he was taken out for a reliever. Ragira blooped a little ball into the infield and that magically scored our two runs.

That was all we got, though. UNC had a homer in the seventh that added two runs to their fragile one-run lead that they’d had for all of the game, and then in the bottom of the eighth they put two more runs on. It basically…was not cool to watch. Seriously.

Here is a depiction of how well we played today, minus starter Mark Appel, who was fantastic. Mark can be the guy at the computer who doesn’t understand the epic fail.

Well, that was a nice way to start things off in the Fullerton regional.

Mark Appel was absolutely stellar tonight. He threw a complete game, giving up seven hits whilst striking out eight. No walks, by the by. Yeah. He was on.

On the offensive side, Stanford took advantage of a bunch of Kansas State errors, and their baserunning was perfect. Lonnie Kauppila was the offensive star of the night with three hits, but almost all of the starters contributed (I believe Austin Wilson was the only one without a hit). Now we’re in the winners’ bracket. That’s a very secure place to be, because now we can lose and not be automatically eliminated.

Kudos to you, Mark Appel, and kudos to this young team. We’re on our way now!

To celebrate our victory in game one, here is a cracktastic Vocaloid video about vegetable juice.

UCLA is ranked 11th in the country right now. ELEVENTH. And we beat them.

7-4′s your final. That’s because we hit a few homers the other night. We got ‘em from Jones and Piscotty and Gaffney. And then Mark Appel went seven innings and only gave up three runs. So basically we played really good baseball and beat the team we were supposed to lose to.

Check out what Nine had to say about it, courtesy of College Baseball Daily:

Also worth mentioning – Arizona State beat Cal in seventeen innings last night. Read up on that here. Sounds like it was a game for the ages and I really wish we had an ASU baseball writer because she and I would have lots of Pac-10 fun.