Oregon Ducks Baseball Eliminated Pac-12 Baseball Tournament: NCAA Tournament Next?

Oregon Ducks Baseball could not get their offense going, suffering their second loss in round robin play. The Ducks are eliminated from their final Pac-12 Baseball Tournament but the postseason may not be over.

Oregon baseball coach Mark Wasikowski, center, plots strategy as the Ducks take San Francisco to extra innings at PK Park March 30, 2022. / Chris Pietsch/The Register-Guard / USA

Oregon Ducks baseball is elimininated from their final Pac-12 baseball tournament. Following Wednesday’s weak performance by the offense in a 4-2 loss to Utah, the Ducks looked to bounce back against the USC Trojans. Unfortunately, the bats never got warmed up and the Ducks fell by the same 4-2 score to the Trojans.

Their second loss in round robin play ends the Ducks bid to defend their 2023 Pac-12 tournament title. Meanwhile, USC advances to a semi-final game on Friday.

Oregon baseball coach Mark Wasikowski, center, plots strategy as the Ducks take San Francisco to extra innings at PK Park March 30, 2022. / Chris Pietsch/The Register-Guard / USA

All Oregon baseball can do now is sit and wait until Monday to learn if they get one of the at-large invitations for the NCAA Tournament. Coming into the Pac-12 tournament, the Ducks were the number three seed and ranked 23rd nationally. As such, an NCAA Tournament bid looked like a certainty.

It still might be, but the Ducks performance in Scottsdale could leave their bid in jeopardy. Consider that prior to Thursday’s game, Oregon ranked 50th in the RPI, which calculates a team’s strength based on a variety of factors like strength of schedule.

“We didn’t get the hits when we needed to win the game,” Oregon coach Mark Wasikowski said. “But the effort that we put out there we felt was a better effort [than yesterday] of what we’re about.” 

Regardless of where Oregon might end up playing in the regional, the Ducks have more work to do, assuming the ticket to the NCAA tournament is still on the table. The problems are certainly not insurmountable and coach Wasikowski has already identified areas on which they can improve.

“I think it’s a combination of some guys trying to do too much and the fact that we faced the conference’s Pitcher of the Year and the guy on the West Coast who’s getting the most draft [talk],” Wasikowski said of the offensive struggles. “We had opportunities, we just didn’t come through.”

The bottom line reveals a game where the Ducks left 10 runners on base, struck out 10 times had one hit with runners in scoring position. “We scored four runs in two games,” Wasikowski said. “Below the line. Below the standard.”

On the bright side, coach Wasikowski was pleased with Oregon’s ace, RJ Gordon. It was a start that kept an offensively challenged team in the game.

“[Gordon] pounded the zone with strikes,” Wasikowski said. “Credit to him. It was the sixth inning when they [finally] strung some things together.” Gordon went six full innings, allowed three runs on eight hits, struck out three and only walked one. However, the Trojans broke through with runs in the sixth and seventh innings to effectively seal the victory.

Now it is just a waiting game. In many ways, the location of the next round is not the most important piece of news the Ducks will get on Monday. First, they need to get that ticket punched to the regionals. The Ducks will learn their postseason fate at 9 am PT, Monday during the selection show on ESPN2.