Just a few short days ago, Stanford welcomed its fresh No. 3 national ranking with a season-high three-game losing streak. After a sweep of San Jose State this weekend and a 7-2 victory over Pacific last night, the Cardinal has reversed its fortunes and with three consecutive wins.

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Jeff Keacher

Junior center fielder Sean Ratliff launched a three-run home run in the fifth inning to help propel the Cardinal to its victory over Pacific last night. Ratliff leads Stanford with 14 blasts on the year and is second with 45 RBI.

After falling in the rankings to No. 6 this week, Stanford (28-15-2, 10-5 Pac-10) sent struggling sophomore starter Jeffrey Inman to the hill to try to rediscover the stuff that spurred him to a 5-0 record before he dropped his last two starts, failing to get past the third inning in either of them.

Pacific (9-35), on the other hand, was just trying to get a win any way it could. The Tigers took the first game between these two teams at Klein Field at Sunken Diamond 10-6 in late March but had won just three more in the interim. Indeed, the Tigers came into last night’s game with just one win in their last 13 games and sent Larry Holscher — who picked up the win against Stanford back in March — to try to snap them out of the skid.

In the end, it was Inman who came through. The Cardinal sophomore dominated the Tigers’ lineup with an excellently located fastball that made Inman’s few breaking pitches all the more effective. He went five innings to pick up the 7-2 win while allowing just two runs and striking out five, improving his record to 6-2 on the year.

The Tigers held on for the first half of the game, though, and even jumped out to an early 1-0 lead. With two outs in the second inning, Inman issued a walk to Tigers catcher Kurt Wideman, bringing first baseman Noah St. Urbain to the plate. St. Urbain jumped all over a fastball and drove it into deep right-center field for an RBI double.

The Cardinal answered quickly, though, and took the lead for good with a three-run third inning. Junior Brent Milleville delivered a bases-loaded single into left field to drive in freshman infielder Jake Schlander and junior outfielder Joey August, giving Stanford a 2-0 lead. Milleville took second, and junior Jason Castro, who was on first when Milleville hit the single, took third on a fielding error by Tiger left fielder Brett Manning. The misplay proved costly as Castro came home moments later on a Randy Molina groundout to make it 3-1 Stanford.

Wideman came around to score again in the fifth, making it 3-2, but in the bottom half of that inning Stanford stepped on the gas and put the game away.

With David Rowse in relief of Holsher, Milleville reached with a one-out single followed by a walk to Molina to put runners on first and second with one out for junior Sean Ratliff. Ratliff — who hit two home runs Sunday against San Jose State, including a game-tying grand slam in the eighth — crushed an inside fastball well over the wall in right center for his 14th homerun of the year to make it 6-2. For Ratliff, it was the first time in his career he has hit more than two homeruns in any two-game span.

“I got a hold of that one pretty good,” Ratliff said. “I was thinking he was going to work me inside with a fastball after coming with a few changeups outside. I saw it pretty well out of his hand and was able to get my hands inside it and get it up in the air, and, fortunately for me, it went out.”

Stanford put one more run on the board in that frame and ran the rest of the way with the 7-2 lead. Freshman Danny Sandbrink came on in relief of Inman to start the sixth and threw two shutout innings while striking out three before yielding to fellow freshman Drew Storen. Storen shut down the Tigers, turning in shutout frames in the eighth and ninth. He allowed just one hit.

With the win, Stanford took the season series from Pacific three games to one, running its all-time record against the Tigers to 51-8-1. The Cardinal returns to action tomorrow afternoon with a 3 p.m. game at the University of San Francisco before wrapping up its home schedule with four games this weekend at Sunken Diamond, including a three-game Pac-10 series against rival Cal.

“All the Pac-10 series are huge, especially this late in the year,” said Ratliff. “Cal thumped us over there earlier and tied us another time, so we would really like to beat them here and get the series win. They are a good team, though, and we should have our hands full.”

The remaining Pac-10 games are critical for Stanford, as the Card currently sits just a half game back from conference leader ASU. Both teams are 10-5 in conference play.