Beavers Win Pac-12 Regular Season Title With 2-0 Victory Over Gonzaga

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Oregon State came into the season as the favorites to take the Pac-12 crown in the conference's first season back. Despite some struggles of late, the Beavers finished the job Saturday night, beating Gonzaga 2-0 to claim the conference's regular season title. With the win, the Beavers finish the regular season with an overall record of 9-4-4, and a conference record of 4-1-1.

After some early back and forth, Gonzaga got some dangerous chances, with shots from Dylan Cantafio and Nicolas Golesis blocked by the Beaver defense. Eventually, Oregon State began to take control of the game, with Evan Carlock and Aidan Marquez forcing saves from Gonzaga goalkeeper Chema Preciado.

Eventually Wyatt Borso broke through the Bulldog defense. In the 34th minute an Oliver Hernandez Parra pass was deflected by the Gonzaga defense, but Milo Wray picked up the rebound and launched an arching pass toward the center of the penalty box. Wyatt Borso found it with his head, punching it into the center of the net.

Just over a minute later Borso was back. In the 36th minute a long pass from Gavin Wolff found Evan Carlock near the right side corner. Carlock arced the ball toward the net, finding Borso who caught the ball with his shin, putting into the right corner of the net.

Borso's two goals give him 15 on the season moves him into a five way tie second place in the most goals in a season for an Oregon State Beaver. He's tied with some big names from Beaver soccer history. Arnau Farnos last year, Logan Fairington from 2023, Gloire Amanda from 2020 and Alan Gordon from 2002. Only Rick Kempf's 17 goals during the 1990 season are ahead of Borso now.

Gonzaga managed to gain momentum at times during the second half, but rarely felt like a threat for the draw. The closest they came was in the 60 minute range. In the 64th minute a Jelle Van Deijck shot forced a leaping save from John Nicolson, and then in the 665h minute a Nicolas Golessi shot resulted in an amazing team save for the Beaver defense.

Much of the drama of the second half came from seeing whether Borso could pull off the hat trick. He had four shots in the second half. The first two were blocked by the Bulldog defense, and shots in the 75th and 76th minute were saved by Chema Preciado. Maybe he'll get there in the conference tournament.

After Saturday's result the Beavers hold the top seed, and they'll take on four seed UC Riverside, who grabbed the fourth seed with a 2-0 victory over Cal Poly. The Beavers beat the Highlanders 4-1 when the two teams met in Corvallis early in October. On the other side of the bracket, two seed Cal Baptist will take on three seed San Diego State

Dates and times for the Pac-12 tournament are not yet set, but should be soon.

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