It’s safe to say that ASU baseball head coach Tracy Smith got his money’s worth out of junior left-hander Eli Lingos on Thursday night.
Lingos was coming off of a March 10 start against Long Beach State in which he allowed six runs (five earned) over six innings. He was tabbed as the starter in the Sun Devils’ (9-8, 0-1 Pac-12) first game of Pac-12 play against Oregon State University (15-1, 1-0 Pac-12).
Lingos earned the loss in Phoenix on Thursday, going seven innings and allowing two earned runs with six hits, three walks and five strikeouts.
But impressively, he took the mound in the seventh inning after already throwing 106 pitches in the first six frames.
He finished the day with 116 pitches.
“I felt good after that sixth inning, I felt really good,” Lingos said. “I just told him I’m good. He wanted to keep rolling with it. I was fine with that.”
Despite his lengthy outing, Lingos struggled to find consistency in earlier parts of the game. He allowed seven of his first 14 batters-faced to reach base safely, and didn’t record a 1-2-3 inning until the sixth.
But Lingos finished his day on a high note, retiring the Beavers' order in both the sixth and seventh innings.
“These last two outings, I kind of get a little better as the game goes on,” Lingos said. “So those last couple innings, I’m not worried about pitch count. I’m just trying to get guys out.”
T6 | ❌❌❌❌❌
— Sun Devil Baseball (@ASU_Baseball) March 17, 2017
The ace is ⬇️. Lingos records his 5th K of the night.#Devils up B6:
⚾️ Canning
⚾️ Cerbo
⚾️ Shapshttps://t.co/COQtGyRcwJ
Lingos’ loss came largely because of the Sun Devils’ struggle to accumulate any offense off of Oregon State’s starter, left-hander Luke Heimlich. The junior held Sun Devil bats hitless until the fifth inning, when Smith used junior infielder Andrew Snow as a pinch-hitter and he reached with a single.
Snow has been out lately after struggling on defense at the beginning of the season. Still, Heimlich was excellent in his outing, allowing just two hits and two walks to the Sun Devils through eight scoreless innings.
He struck out eight hitters en route to the win.
“We ran into a really, really good pitcher tonight, plain and simple,” Smith said. “Our guy was pretty good, their guy was really good.”
UP NEXT
The Sun Devils continue their Pac-12 slate with two more games against OSU, Friday at 4 p.m. and Saturday at noon. Freshman Spencer Van Scoyoc will start on Friday.
Current Status: IT'S LIT pic.twitter.com/n1dZkgu3Bm
— Sun Devil Baseball (@ASU_Baseball) March 17, 2017
Reach the reporter at matthew.layman@asu.edu or follow @Mattjlayman on Twitter.
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