Stanford baseball, in last place in the Pacific-10 Conference, went on the road to Pullman, Wash. this weekend to face its closest competitor: ninth-place Washington State. After splitting the first two of three games against the Cougars, the Cardinal is still looking for its first Pac-10 series victory today, hoping to tie Wazzu in the league standings.

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Freshman Jeffrey Inman pitched his first complet egame of his career this past Saturday in Stanford’s 6-4 win over Washington State. The Card looks to win the series outright today at noon. #gallery http://daily.stanford.edu/image/full/7449
Maggie Skortcheva

Freshman Jeffrey Inman pitched his first complet egame of his career this past Saturday in Stanford’s 6-4 win over Washington State. The Card looks to win the series outright today at noon.

Saturday marked Stanford’s (19-25, 4-13 Pac-10) first win in a series opener win against a league opponent, as the Cardinal downed the Cougars (22-21, 5-12) by a 6-4 margin. Stanford rode freshman Jeffrey Inman’s first complete game to just their fourth conference win of the season. Inman’s record improved to 4-2, as the right hander gave up just one earned run.

“I really didn’t have all my pitches going today, but I just let them get themselves out,” Inman said to GoStanford.com. “I saw they were swinging at everything, so I was just trying to get my fastball over and trying to be more efficient than I’ve been in my last couple of outings.”

Offensively, the Cardinal put on a powerful show for the Pullman crowd and a television audience, as the game was broadcast on FSN Northwest. Sophomore center fielder Sean Ratliff knocked in four RBI with two home runs, and junior Michael Taylor hit his eighth homer of the season on a solo shot to right center.

“We’ve been working on a lot of things as a team,” Taylor said to GoStanford.com. “Those things are starting to pay off now. Hitting is very contagious, and that’s why we’ve been able to score a lot of runs the last couple of weeks.”

With the improving Stanford offense — which had notched double-digit hit totals in nine straight contests following Saturday’s game — and Inman’s strong outing, it was Stanford’s defense that kept things interesting for much of the game. The Cardinal gave up three unearned runs against the Cougars on four errors; three of those were committed by freshman shortstop Adam Gaylord.

Stanford failed to keep rolling on Sunday, though, falling 8-6 in the second game of the series. The Cardinal led 5-1 heading into the bottom half of the fourth, but sophomore lefty Jeremy Bleich was unable to get out of the inning, giving up four runs over 3.2 frames. Juniors David Stringer and Nolan Gallagher proved largely ineffective in relief, and the Cardinal offense was quiet most of the game after scoring four runs in the first two innings.

Meanwhile, Washington State reliever Jeremy Johnson largely shut the Cardinal down, not allowing a hit over 2.1 innings of work. At the plate, third baseman Paul Gran was a force for the Cougars, going 5-5 with a home run, two runs scored and three RBI.

Junior designated hitter Brendan Domaracki and junior second baseman Adam Sorgi were offensive bright spots for Stanford. Domaracki went 2-3 with three RBI and Sorgi notched two RBI on 3-4 hitting in the loss. The Cardinal fell just one hit shy, though, of extending its streak of double-digit hits to 10 games.

The rubber match of the three-game series will be played at noon today and broadcast on KZSU radio. At stake for Stanford is a chance to snap its streak of six straight series losses as well as a separate streak of six straight conference series defeats.

A win would also pull the Cardinal even with the Cougars for last place in the conference standings. Stanford would still be one game behind its next-closest competition in the Pac-10, Southern California. The Trojans currently sit at seventh place in the conference with a league record of 6-9.