Oklahoma State Defeats Clemson, 3-2

Nobody is bashing Oklahoma State anymore.

The Cowboys, perhaps the most criticized selection for the 64-team NCAA baseball tournament, proved they belong Saturday night with a 3-2 victory over top-seeded Clemson in the Clemson Regional.

Neil Medchill drove in Micheal Dabbs with a two-out single in the eighth inning for the winning run in the second-round, winners bracket game. Medchill's sharp grounder hit the glove of sprawling Clemson first baseman Ben Paulsen and trickled into the outfield grass, allowing Dabbs to score from second without a throw. Dabbs had reached second when the Tigers failed to make a catch in left-center on a play ruled a double.

Freshman Randy McCurry (4-1) shut down the Tigers in order in the ninth.

OSU coach Frank Anderson said his team, which finished ninth in the 10-team Big 12 Conference standings, never paid attention to outside criticism.

"We really haven't thought about it that much,"
Anderson said. "I never discussed it one time with our kids. What are you going to say?"

The Cowboys (34-22), the only unbeaten team in the regional, will play either Clemson (41-20) or Tennessee Tech for the championship Sunday night.

McCurry got the Cowboys out of an eighth-inning jam with the game tied and the lead run on third base. Lefthander Andrew Oliver took a shutout into the eighth before allowing two tying runs on singles by Chris Epps and Mike Freeman.

Cowboys Tom Belza and Mark Ginther broke open a scoreless tie with back-to-back homers in the seventh inning off Tiger starter Casey Harman.
Ryan Hinson (2-1) came in after Ginther's homer.

Clemson had eight hits, including two by Paulsen.
OSU had only five hits, two by Medchill.

Belza's homer was his fourth in two games, though only his sixth of the season.

"I'm not really sure," Belza said when asked the reason for his playoff power surge.

The Tigers hit into two line-drive double plays and lined out a third time with a runner on second base.

"I thought we put some good swings on the ball,"
Clemson coach Jack Leggett said.

Clemson vs. Oklahoma State Quotes
Game 4 - May 30, 2009

Clemson Head Coach Jack Leggett

On Game
"It was a tough loss for us. I thought Casey pitched a heck of a game for us. Oliver did a nice job pitching, we just couldn't seem to catch up to his fastball there and we had some men on base. Our golden opportunity was when we tied it up 2-2 and we had men on second and third and couldn't finish it off. It was a rough ballgame, but now our goal is focused on the game tomorrow at three o'clock."

On hard hitting right at fielders
"It's frustrating, there is no question about it. I thought we put some good swings on the ball, when Boyd hit that ball to the third baseman. We kept hitting the balls hard, but you have to find some holes. If we could find a few holes then we can position ourselves at the end. We just need to find a way to get men on base. From top to bottom we just need to be a little bit more productive, and make a little bit better adjustments sometimes. WE have to just come back tomorrow and put this one behind us. Our new goal is to win this first ballgame and then get that second one.

On Fly to Left
"I thought when it was hit that it had a chance to drop, but it hung up there for us and then I don't think it miss communicated. He may not have seen Jeff come out of the corner of his eye, or what happened. It's obviously unfortunate, if we could have made that play we would have been in better shape. Now we have to go back and concentrate on tomorrow."

On Pitchers
"Well we have some pitching left, so we will be okay. We will be ready to play tomorrow. We will throw Chris Dwyer on the mound tomorrow and just take one inning at a time, one game at a time. Get ourselves back where we need to be and give ourselves an opportunity to win. I think we have enough arms, we just have to hit the ball, play good defense and pick up some runs with men on base."

On Getting a faster start
"We just need to get some leadoff men on base, and then like I said just have to break the ice a little bit early. As the game goes on, they were the home team and Casey was pitching so well we needed to get him some runs to give him more margin for error. WE just have to keep on battling, keep working our line up, find a way to get leadoff men on base, push them around, and just do all of those things that teams that win tournaments have to do."

On Home-field advantage
"I hope they will come out tomorrow and get behind our kids. Our kids have been battling hard and we have our back against the wall so what better time to support your team than tomorrow."

Casey Harman on pitches hit for home runs "First one was a slider, and the second one was a fastball. He put a pretty good swing on the slider, if I could take that pitch back I would and throw a better one to him."

On Belza
"Obviously I heard about him hitting the three home runs, but my mentality I go out and try to get everyone out. I don't look at somebody like I have to pitch him differently than anybody else, you have to go after everybody. That's how I was trying to be tonight, but he got the best to me and I tip my hat to him. WE are just going to try and move forward and win these next couple of games."

Ben Paulsen
"Just have to play the next game our
hardest. This one will actually have a chance to be our last one. We just need to play our best baseball, and I have a good feeling about tomorrow."

On Grounder
"That is one of those plays that you
practice. You feel like you can make it every time, but it just hit off the heel of my glove and into the outfield. I guess it was hit just hard enough and off my glove for a runner to score off second."

Oklahoma State Head Coach Frank Anderson

On Game
"Obviously it was a really well played game.
Casey pitched very well for Clemson, and then we had one scratch hit I think through 6 innings, then we hit a couple balls pretty hard and they hit some balls pretty hard as well. We got double plays out of them, and it was that type of baseball. I thought it was very competitive from both sides and there was a great crowd, and a good win for us."

On Oklahoma State Pitcher McCurry
"He's done a good job for us obviously. He's a freshman and he's had some situations that have been tough for him, so he's been through tough situations. He's very competitive, and he's going to go out there and battle. And that's the biggest thing when you get in these situations; you have to have kids that will compete and he'll go out there and do that.

On Criticism about making the tournament "We really haven't thought about it that much. I was more worried about getting our team prepared the week that we didn't play in the conference tournament and never discussed it one time with the kids really, because what are you going to say? We just went about practice in the same way and watched the show, so I don't think there was that much of a chip on our shoulder. We just wanted to play and have fun and play clean baseball. And that's been our biggest goal."

Oklahoma State INF Tom Belza on hitting so many home runs "[laughs] I'm not really sure [what's going on].
I'm just up there hitting it, and I was down 1-2, same deal as yesterday. I wasn't really looking for anything, and I got a curveball and just got the barrel to it. I thought it was going to go foul, but it straightened out a lot. I don't know what happened to it, but it stayed fair so I was pretty happy."

Oklahoma State LHP Andrew Oliver on Game "I was just preparing myself to pitch like I would start the game. As far as the game, I thought it was exciting. We got a couple of huge plays to help us out to get out of the inning.
Our guys were ready to play and they came swinging the bats. I was just trying to battle that other guy because he was putting up zeroes, but I thought overall we were ready to play this game."

On 8th inning and giving up 2 runs
"I felt good. They started leaning toward the other half of the plate towards the end there and found some holes."