Halfway through the conference schedule, the No. 5 ASU baseball team will be looking to make a late season run to the top of the Pac-10 standings, starting today when it hosts Washington State at Packard Stadium.
The Sun Devils (39-9, 7-5 Pac-10) are coming off a rough weekend against UCLA in which they lost two one-run games. This week, ASU head coach Pat Murphy continues to mix things up, reorganizing the starting rotation once again.
Getting the nod for tonight's 7 p.m. start at Packard Stadium will be senior right-hander Beau Vaughan. It's Vaughan's first Pac-10 start since receiving a no decision at USC on March 28 when he surrendered four earned runs in 4.2 innings of work.
Senior Jered Liebeck, who has started 11 of the 13 games he's appeared in, will most likely settle into a role in the bullpen where Murphy can use him more frequently.
"If we can only use Beau once, we might as well use him on Fridays," Murphy said. "Liebeck is going to assume a new role in the middle [innings]. That way, we can use him in more than one game and just one time around [the batting order]."
Saturday's starter is still up in the air, but will most likely be freshman Erik Averill. The southpaw was roughed up last week against UCLA but carries an impressive 3.36 ERA. Senior Ben Thurmond will return to pitch Sunday after his longest and most impressive outing of the season last week - one run in seven innings and seven strikeouts.
Murphy has also been very creative with the batting order this season, using 44 different lineups in 48 games.
"I'm going to use basically the same 13 guys, but it just gives us options and keeps guys competing all season," Murphy said. "I wish I could use the same lineup every game but that doesn't happen in college baseball."
One of the major lineup changes of late was the move of sophomore shortstop Dustin Pedroia from the leadoff spot to the three hole. The switch came during a resurgence period for junior outfielder Nick Walsh where he's 11-for-19 (.579) in the past five games. Walsh was hitting leadoff during that stretch until last Saturday when Murphy moved Pedroia back to the top of the lineup.
"It doesn't matter if I hit third or leadoff, my approach stays the same: just trying to get on base," said Pedroia, who went 4-for-6 from the leadoff spot Saturday after going 3-for-18 in the previous four games while batting third. "If my name's on the roster, that's all I care about. There's no more pressure in the three-hole."
Saturday's start is also slated for 7 p.m. with a noon start for the series finale on Sunday.
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Reach the reporter at casey.pritchard@asu.edu.
