Oregon State Eliminates Cal State Fullerton, 5-2

FULLERTON — Cal State Fullerton’s resurgence in the PONY Invitational softball tournament came to an end Saturday.

Unranked Oregon State scored three runs in a tiebreaker eighth inning, two of them on Amy Warner’s second home run of the game, and eliminated the Titans, 5-2, in quarterfinal play at the Titan Softball Complex.

Oregon State (15-8) also stopped Titan pitcher Jana Oetgen’s three-game winning streak. Oetgen had given up only one home run previously this season, but there was no doubt about either of Warner’s two shots as soon as they left the bat.

“She has a beautiful swing, and she got into both of those [homers],” Titan Coach Judi Garman said. “But you have to give their pitcher a lot of credit too. We didn’t hit the ball real solidly all day.”

The Titans (10-13) managed eight hits off Tarrah Beysler. “The problem was that the hits didn’t come when we really needed to do some things,” Garman said. “From that standpoint, I think our youth showed.”

Garman, however, was upbeat despite the loss. The Titans entered the tournament with a six-game losing streak, but won three of five games. “The exciting thing is that when you consider the whole tournament, we grew up a lot as a team,” Garman said. “I though Jana had a great tournament. She was the story for us this week.”

Oetgen gave up nine hits but shut out Oregon State through the first four innings. Oregon State scored the game’s first run in the fifth. Oetgen gave up a single to Alycia Stevens and a double to Jodi Chmielewski, and the run scored on Shelley Beringhele’s sacrifice fly. Oregon State made it 2-0 in the sixth on Warner’s first homer of the game.

Fullerton came back to tie the score with two runs in the bottom of the sixth.

Pinch-hitter Carrie Davis led off with a bunt single. Nikki Hart, also trying to bunt, lined back to the pitcher, but Beysler’s wild throw to first enabled Davis to reach third. Rachel Olvera beat out a chopper to short, scoring Davis, and a hit by Bevan Trueblood drove in Olvera with the tying run.

The semifinals of the tournament are at 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. today. The title game is scheduled for 2 p.m.