Oregon State is hosting another regional

Probably no Super-regional this time, but hosting another regional is huge!

OSU Finishes Regular Season No. 8 In USA Today/ESPN Poll - Official Site of Oregon State Athletics


Get those tickets today!

More Flickr OSU photo galleries!

I love finding this stuff. Here's another Flickr photo stream with some great Beaver football photos:

BrittElizabeth's photostream



Here's some more I found a week ago:

A huge collection of OSU Beavers football photos on Flickr

Great weekend for the Beavs!

Congrats to the Beaver softball team for winning the Corvallis regional and moving on to the Super Regional!

Huge weekend for the Beaver baseball team after scoring 10 runs or more three straight games to sweep the WSU Cougars. Only one win away from a second consecutive Pac-10 championship. A series win against the Bruins would probably make the Beavers a lock for a regional.

Here are some random articles that appeared over the last few days that I thought were interesting:

Sprague shortshop is a fielder of dreams - StatesmanJournal.com

Beavers come calling for Morales - LA Daily News

Yliniemi assigned to AFL2 team - StatesmanJournal.com

A huge collection of OSU Beavers football photos on Flickr

I found another Beaver photo stream on Flickr. This one is a motherload with 1200 beaver pics. Great close-ups of the players and even some nostalga with some photos from 2002.

Thanks Greg Keene for these great pics!

Flickr: Photos from gregkeene

OSU Softball Regional Games Broadcast Live

Somehow missed this one:

OSU Softball Regional Games Live on Radio - Official Site of Oregon State Athletics

Oregon State's NCAA Softball Regional games will be carried live on radio in the greater Corvallis area on KTHH 990 AM (Clear Channel)

Beavs could be getting ready for another stretch run

It's only one game, but the Beavers look like they may be ready for another late season run. After a little lineup tweak by coach Casey they Beavs have been hitting much better. We need Mitch Canham back and driving in runs for us and it looks like he might be ready to start doing that again after 5 RBI and a HR against WSU. I hope this trend continues becasue the Beavs need a strong finish so that they can peak in the CWS instead on the regional this year.

Buck, Canham power OSU, 16-1 - Corvallis Gazette-Times

Whew! Beavs pull the first game out in NCAA regional

The first game result for the Beavs softball team seems eerily similar to the baseball team last season. The first game was a struggle and they need some late inning heroics to pull it out. Well, this was a similar game for the softball team as they needed to manufacture a run in their last at bat to win 2-1 over Nevada. Hopefully now they we continue to mirror the 2005 baseball regional and beat Baylor by about 10 runs.

OSU rallies past Nevada - StatesmanJournal.com

“I’m really excited to get the first win coming out for regionals be-cause the years before we always lost the first game,” said McGowan, who tossed a three-hitter with 10 strikeouts. “So getting the first win is huge for our team.”

Portland State, meanwhile, lost a really tough one where they had the game in hand but lost on a walk off home run by Baylor. Bummer. They have beat Nevada 3 times this year so hopefully they can get a win and get back in this thing.

PSU streaming softball games from Corvallis

For those interested in listening to some of the other games at the Corvallis softball regional, check out the PSU website. Looks like they are streaming the games for free. Could be good to know if PSU plays OSU later in the tournament.

GoViks.com - Live Audio Broadcast

You can also get the Beavers games on OSUBeavers.com if you are a subscriber.

Softball regional this weekend

Well, the posts are going to get further and further apart as we head into summer. Between moving and my summer trip to Europe, I'll do my best. I'll be back strong for football season.

Here's some info on the Softball team that I found. They are hosting an NCAA regional this weekend and if they win they will host the super regional as well. This year they could be setup for their best shot at the College Softball World Series ever.

First game is against Nevada on Friday. Go Beavs!

Softball nabs No. 7 seed, will host regional

The Beavers have a 20-14 overall record in their seven previous trips to the Regional Tournament and have reached the championship game on five occasions (1999, 2000, 2003, 2004, 2005) before being eliminated. OSU is the only Pac-10 school never to have gone to the World Series.

Questions loom as softball championship approaches

Last year, the Beavers were shipped across the country after claiming a share of the Pac-10 title, but ace Brianne McGowan's squad gets to stay in Corvallis this year, thanks in part to the success of nearby Portland State. With two tournament teams representing different conferences coming out of Oregon, awarding the regional to Oregon State was both practical and overdue. This will be the eighth consecutive trip to the NCAA Tournament for the Beavers, but it's the first time they'll be playing at home.

[...]

I'm also looking forward to the potential Pac-10 punch of California vs. Oregon State. The Beavers and Bears have met three times this year; Thorson shut out Oregon State twice, but the Beavers made the necessary strides and swiped a 4-2 win the third time around at home in Corvallis. These teams are not strangers; they have no secret weapons to release. They will each need some scrappy strategy to advance.

[...]

5A. Which eight teams will reach Oklahoma City?

Buckheit: UCLA, Tennessee, Alabama, Texas A&M, Texas, Georgia, Oregon State and Arizona.

Hays: UCLA, Michigan, Alabama, Northwestern, Texas, Georgia, Cal, and Arizona.

Just found this great article on OSU Softball

Whoa, I missed this ESPN article on OSU Softball and it's rise on the national scene. Great profile of the team and has to be an amazing recruiting tool for Kirk Walker.

ESPN.com - NCAA - Hays: McGowan missing gem on Oregon State's roster

The main reason I chose Oregon State was that I loved it when I took my trip here," McGowan said about her choice. "The team was amazing, and the town seemed like a great place to spend four years. And it turns out I was right."

[...]

Despite not having any of the 12 best individual batting averages among Pac-10 players, the Beavers are the conference's best hitting team with a .313 collective average. And they aren't all singles. Only UCLA and Arizona State have more home runs, and only Washington has more doubles.

Paced most of the season by 5-foot-1 sparkplug Mia Longfellow (hitting .364 with 15 extra-base hits), the Beavers have survived the typically tough transition to a steady diet of Pac-10 pitching thanks in large part to McGowan's pitching and sophomore Cambria Miranda's hitting.

As a freshman, Miranda led the team with a .324 average last spring, but that number hid a .175 average in conference play. But like any great hitter, Miranda made adjustments and is hitting .361 with five home runs in 11 conference games this season.

[...]

Softball country is what you make of it.

And these days, the Beavers have made quite a bit of it in Corvallis.

The softball team has been good for a long time (10 years or so?), but until the last two years they have yet to really challenge for a top spot in the nation let alone Pac-10. Now they are starting to do that. If they can get into the College World Series for softball this year, they could become the next Pac-10 team to win a National Championship. Now that would be cool.

ESPN Pac-10 team-by-team wrap up

For those interested in how the rest of the Pac-10 teams did this spring, here is ESPN's view (written by Seattle writer Ted Miller).

ESPN.com - NCF - Pac-10 team-by-team spring guide

Oregon State Beavers

Oregon State had two glaring -- glaring -- deficiencies last season: pass defense and quarterback Matt Moore. Both appear improved after spring practices concluded. Moore -- who tossed 19 interceptions with only 11 touchdowns -- appears to have a far better grasp of the offense. His life also should be easier because he's surrounded by an experienced offense, including tailback Yvenson Bernard, five returning starters on the offensive line and a solid if unspectacular receiving corps that has been fortified by the return from injury of tight end Joe Newton.

The secondary produced the nation's worst pass defense a year ago, yielding 300 yards per game and 31 touchdowns passes. It showed some spunk this spring. It also should benefit from improved play on the defensive line. The Beavers produced just 22 sacks, tied for last in the Pac-10. That lack of pressure didn't help the secondary. Spring showed that there appears to be capable depth on the line, with tackles Pernell Booth, Curtis Coker, Naymon Frank and Ben Siegert as well as ends Joe Lemma, Joe Rudulph, Dorian Smith and Jeff Van Orsow making it appear an eight-man rotation is possible.

Well, that's a pretty positive view of things. I hope it works out that way this spring. I was encouraged by what I saw in the spring game.

Dallas Buck profiled in Baseball America

The #5 ranked Beavers are starting to get more National publicity lately. Here's a new article previewing this weekend's matchup with UW and spotlighting tonight's pitching duel:

BaseballAmerica.com: College: College Weekend Preview: May 5-7

Beaver Baseball recruiting news

Beaver baseball looks like it setting up the pitching staff of the future for next year and are taking them from UW's back yard. That's what I like to see.

On Campus | PortlandTribune.com

"Oregon State has signed four JC baseball players out of Washington, including three from the state’s top-ranked team, Lower Columbia — pitchers D.J. Lidyard and Kyle Foster and shortstop Drew George.

The Beavers also will regain the services of pitcher Josh Keller, who played for them a year ago but was sent to Lower Columbia to get more innings. Keller is 6-0 with an 0.90 ERA. The 6-4, 235-pound righty from Cleveland High, who redshirted at OSU last year, allowed two hits with 10 strikeouts and one walk in a 7-0 win over Grays Harbor on Sunday.

Lidyard, a 6-3, 230-pound right-hander, is 6-2 with a 1.76 ERA. “D.J. tops out at about 95 mph,” says L-C coach Kelly Smith, an assistant for Jack Dunn at Portland State from 1984 to ‘90. “It’s a tossup who is No. 1 for us, Josh or D.J. They’ve both been outstanding.”

The other JC signee is Columbia Basin first/third baseman Steve Marquardt."

Love to see those fireballers. Big series this weekend against UW. Gotta pull off the series victory. Get out and cheer on the Beavs!

Blurb in Buffalo on their new LB Keith Ellison

I hope Keith sticks at Buffalo. He could be a great special teams guy for a year while he learns, then maybe gets in there in spot situations as an OLB. He could be an awesome 3rd down LB for sure.

Buffalo News - Long wait puts chip on shoulder of fourth-round pick

"When you're a late-round draft pick, it never hurts to do a little bit of everything. Keith Ellison's versatility may earn him a spot on the Bills' roster.
The Bills took the Oregon State star in the sixth round because of his ability to play all three linebacker spots.

'You like it when you get a guy at this point in the draft that can give you a lot of help in different ways,' said Bills scout Brad Forsythe. 'He's going to be able to do that with no problem mentally.'

Versatility is nothing new to Ellison. He played quarterback, linebacker and safety in high school. He played exclusively at strong safety in junior college before making the switch to outside linebacker after transferring to Oregon State.

He adapted very well to the new position, recording 251/2 tackles behind the line of scrimmage in 23 games with the Beavers.

'Starting at safety helped me to play outside linebacker,' he said. 'I was able to play out in space and I was able to cover running backs and tight ends. Just the experience of playing safety I think it's going to translate well to the skills I need at linebacker.' "

Another Beaver goes to Buffalo. They aren't quite Cincinnati yet, but they're getting close.

Cool gadget lets you sync radio with the TV on football broadcasts

Hey, I remember there was a Beaver fan who was inventing something like this a few years ago. Not sure if this is the same guy or if someone beat him to the punch, but it's a cool gadget regardless.

So what is it?

DelayPlayRadio lets you sync FM audio with cable or satellite sports broadcasts - Engadget

Well, basically it lets you manually delay a radio broadcast to sync to exactly with a TV broadcast. So now you can listen to Mike and Jim instead of some less knowledgeable nation broadcasters.

Pretty cool.

Here's the product website: DelayPlay. It's not cheap and I have no idea if it works, but hey if it's REALLY important to sync radio with TV, then maybe it's for you.