Yes college baseball fans, the Washington Huskies may be off-the-radar, but they are definitely on-a-roll with Sunday’s 5-0 win at USC.

The Washington Huskies... laid back, relaxed as hell and as cool as the Pacific Northwest.

Living on the fringes of most at-large discussions are the Washington Huskies, who came into today’s third game at USC with a No. 42 RPI and a rather unsexy record of 25-18. In the Pac 12, they were right at the Mendoza Line of 10-10, tied with Oregon State for 6th in the conference.

That’s fringeland if I’ve ever seen it.

Today, the Huskies completed an impressive road sweep at USC with a 4-0 squashing of the Trojans where they didn’t commit a single error the entire weekend and only issued two walks in the three games. Couple in 43 hits and 18 runs, while giving up just 13 hits and three runs and you’ve got 7-0, 6-3 and 5-0 wins at Dedeaux Field.

The flip-side of that series sweep was that it all but knocked the Trojans out of the at-large possibilities.

The big question is whether or not the Pac 12 gets more than five bids to the Big Dance. Everybody can pretty much agree that Oregon, Arizona, UCLA, Stanford and Oregon State will be in the field of 64. Does Arizona State’s ineligibility help Washington’s hopes of making the field? And since the University of Washington is one of those unfortunate locations where it’s being so isolated from any neighboring schools means its RPI is effected by things like long travel, few mid-week opportunities and repeated games against teams in its area.

The Huskies are coming off a 2011 season where they won only 17 games and finished dead-last in the Pac 12. But coach Lindsay Meggs is building a real burgeoning program in Seattle. They have 21 newcomers on the roster for 2012, including a stellar recruiting class which was ranked 33rd in the country by Collegiate Baseball and featured four players who were drafted last June.

So there’s a good bit of youth to this team, including three freshmen in today’s starting lineup. With series vs. UCLA, at Arizona State and vs. Washington State, it will be interesting to see if these guys continue to play as high-quality ball as they did this weekend. And it will also be interesting to see how their RPI is effected with each win and loss.

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WHAT I SAW AT DEDEAUX FIELD.

It could be argued that the Washington Huskies played almost a perfect weekend of baseball. It’s one of those things where if people ask me, “Have you seen Washington play this year?” I’ll have to answer something like, “Yeah, and when I saw them, they played about as good of a game of baseball as I’d seen all year.” Does that mean that Udub is the best team in the country? Well, no. But it means that from what I’ve seen, these guys can beat anybody. Now… with they get the chance?

Husky ace reliever Josh Fredendall has eight saves on the season and pitched a perfect 9th inning in the win over USC today.

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LINESCORE:

U.W. – 000 000 401 – 5  9  0

USC – 000 000 000 – 0  3  4

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PITCHERS

WP: Tyler Kane, 5-1

LP: Wyatt Straha, 3-3

Save: None

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TOP HITTERS.

UW:

- Caleb Brown, 2-for-5, 2RBI

- Trevor Mitsui, 2-for-4

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USC:

- Kevin Swick, 1-for-3, double

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RECORDS.

- Washington, 26-18, 11-10 Pac 12

- USC, 22-21, 7-13 Pac 12

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IN A NUTSHELL.

The game was moving along at a brisk clip through the first six innings as both starting pitchers did exemplary work as Udub’s Jeff Brigham gave up just two hits and struck out three and SC’s Bobby Wheatley spread out five hits with one K. But Washington broke things open in the 7th when Trevor Mitsui started things off with a single, followed by an outfield error, a walk, an RBI flyout to centerfield, a plunking, an infield error and then the big blow, a two-run single by Caleb Brown. That made for four runs and put the Trojans on their heels the rest of the way.

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IT WAS OVER WHEN…

- The Husky bullpen took over.

After that four-run 7th, the trio of Tyler Kane, Nick Palewicz and Josh Fredendall put the Trojans to pasture with four innings of one-hit work, forcing five groundouts and six flyouts. Tyler Kane was given credit for the win, improving his mark to 5-1 on the season.

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COACH SPEAK.

Since I was really interested in what Washington head coach Lindsay Meggs’ thoughts would be after such an impressive weekend, I tracked him down after the game and asked him a few questions about the weekend and the program in general.

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Me:

Give me some thoughts on your teams’ performance this weekend and how their ebbing and flowing of late.

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Coach Meggs:

Well we really played very well. I mean, we don’t make an error all weekend and that’s a credit to how hard we’ve been working on our defense. Plus we only walked two guys all weekend. So when we’re throwing strikes on the mound and we’re working quickly like we like our pitchers to do, it usually means we’re playing good defense.

And it really puts the pressure on them (USC), because we never gave them that opening. You know, we made them have to get three hits in an inning in order to score a run and that’s difficult to do against anybody in our league, especially with the way the game is played now. I think that was the most important thing in the way we pitched and the way we played defense.

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Me:

I don’t wanna say the word “surprised” because you have a good team, but did you feel pretty fortunate to get three wins down here this weekend?

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Coach Meggs:

Oh absolutely. Frank (Cruz) and his staff are doing a great job at rebuilding this program, just like we are. They’re at a point in time where they’re trying to work on the culture of their program, so I think we just caught them at the right time. The next time we face them it will be a completely different mindset with different athletes, so I consider us very fortunate to come down here and do this.

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Me:

Tell me a little bit about the program itself and how it has grown in the three years that you’ve been there.

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Coach Meggs:

The biggest challenge for us was just to change the culture there when we got in there. And the way recruiting works nowadays in the terms of the early commitments, we basically sat on a lot of guys until this fall. We brought in 21 new guys this fall, it’s the largest class in my 25 years of coaching. We’re playing five freshmen at a time and they’ve learned from the older guys who stuck around. This league is relentless. You have to keep battling and never give in. There were times when we could’ve quit, but we stuck together and we’re just trying to outlast everybody. We’re just gonna hang around ’til the end and see what happens. I give the guys all the credit for that.

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Me:

Talk for a bit about your RPI. I know you guys are a little off the radar coming into this weekend in the low 40s range. You’ve got UCLA next weekend and Arizona State the weekend after that… What are you looking for from your team from here on out in order to get into the Big Dance?

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Coach Meggs:

We told our guys that our goal every weekend is to win every series we play, and that’s all we can control. You look at the RPI and people look at that, that’s for you guys to crunch those numbers and to talk about it.

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Me:

I know, it’s bullshit.

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Coach Meggs:

… YOU said that, I didn’t.

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Me:

Yeah, I know.

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Coach Meggs:

Our goal is to be better at the end of the year and to play our best baseball when Wazzu comes to town (on the final weekend) and that’s all we’re talking about.

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Me:

You’ve got a lot of young guys, like you said. Have they grown a lot in the last few weeks? Do you see your team on a bit of an uptick right now?

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Coach Meggs:

Yeah. You know we use Stanford from last year as an example for our guys. They had a lot of young guys playing early but by the end of the year they were a completely different team than they were at the beginning of the year. Nobody’s a freshman any more, we’re 40-some games into it and everybody has seen what they’re gonna see. They just have to go out there and compete. There are no freshmen on our club any more.

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Me:

Oh, tell me the latest on the new stadium. When’s that going to be ready?

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Coach Meggs:

We finished our team building. That’s done. We moved into a 9000 square foot building that has everything: our clubhouse to offices to the training room. Our plan is to break ground (on the stadium part) as soon as possible. As soon as this season ends. So what we’re doing is racing the city of Seattle with the permit process and as soon as we get everything okay’d we going to start on that.

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PICS

A few images from the last few innings of today’s game at Dedeaux Field.

The way-too-talented Caleb Brown stroked the game-clinching two-run single in the 7th inning.

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3rd baseman Jacob Lamb and the Husky defense didn't commit a single error the entire weekend at USC. I ain't lyin', check out the scoreboard totals in the background.

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The defense made the spectacular plays too, such as this Willie Mays-like over the shoulder catch by centerfielder Jayce Ray.

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Washington reliever Nick Palewicz did a lock-down job on the mound late in the game.

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... and then showed great versatility in moving on to play a game of "wall ball" with the Husky ball boy immediately afterward.

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USC didn't have a lot of highlights, but reliever Martin Viramontes had a decent outing on the hill today for the men in gold.

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Here come the Huskies. Washington has a lot of fight left in them as we go down the stretch of the 2012 season. We'll see if that fight turns into an NCAA tournament bid. There is no Pac 12 tournament so Udub will have to stay hot in their last three weekends of regular season play.

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OTHER STUFF.

Okay, I’ve gotta get myself to start on my weekend wrap-up stuff for ESPN, so I’ll have to make this a speed-round type of thing. And yes, I realize I MUST touch on a few things from today or some fan bases out there are going to hate me… like, moreso.

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THREE UP

The best of the day in college baseball.

1- CORNELL.

Congratulations to the Big Red on earning the first bid to the NCAA tournament after beating Dartmouth today in the rubber match. The Big Red won 3-1 in 11 innings on a two-run homer from Chris Cruz.

I purloined this pic from the Cornell site (please don't sue me, I've got enough legal problems). Chris Cruz gets a heroes welcome at home plate.

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2- SOUTH CAROLINA, LSU AND OREGON.

Each of these behemoths won huge getaway games on the road in big showdowns at Arkansas, Ole Miss and Arizona, respectively. Now, the Gamecocks lead the SEC East, the Tigers lead the SEC West and the Ducks have taken over a game-and-a-half lead in the Pac 12.

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3- PURDUE.

Boy did the Boilermaker’s need this one. The Hammer and Rails scored 10 runs in the top of the 9th inning, including seven straight two-out hits, to overcome UCLA’s 10-5 lead and pull out an unlikely but necessary 15-11 win in Westwood.

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THREE DOWN

The worst of the day in college baseball.

1- ARKANSAS, OLE MISS, TEXAS A&M, UCLA, ARIZONA, UCF and APPALACHIAN STATE.

They all lost Sunday games at home, with the Razorbacks, Rebels and Wildcats all losing weekend series in the process.

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2- STANFORD, SAM HOUSTON STATE AND TEXAS.

These ranked teams went on the road, but were upset by Oregon State, UT-Arlington and Missouri respectively, handing them crucial series losses in the process.

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3- THE HOME TEAMS IN THE BIG SOUTH.

Campbell upset Coastal Carolina, Radford beat Gardner-Webb, UNC-Asheville outlasted High Point and Winthrop edged Charleston Southern, making all four matchups being dropped by the home team. The one saving grace was Presbyterian upsetting No. 13 Central Florida, 7-2.

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FYI, it’s just after 2am and I’m watching Fletch on HBO. What a great end to a great day.

If you haven't seen the 1986 movie "Fletch" starring Chevy Chase, rent it tomorrow night. You'll be glad you did.

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Okay, gotta go. More in a day or so. If I missed something, give me a break. Not that you owe me or anything.

G’night