Oregon State’s Jacob Melton leads the Beavers into the Pac-12 tournament, starting Wednesday.

Oregon State was in position to win its first Pac-12 Conference championship since 2017 going into the final two series of the regular season.

That goal slipped away from the Beavers (41-13, 20-10), who finished one game behind Stanford (37-14, 21-9) in the final standings. There is no time for the players to think about that, however, because there is a new challenge this week.

The Pac-12 Conference will hold its inaugural postseason tournament this week in Scottsdale, Arizona. The No. 2-seeded Beavers will open play at 4:45 p.m. Wednesday against No. 7 Washington (30-24, 14-16).

The Beavers climbed to the top of several national polls as they rode an eight-game winning streak earlier this month. That was followed by a four-game losing streak which the team ended with a convincing win on Saturday against UCLA. Oregon State center fielder Jacob Melton said the 9-3 victory over the Bruins was important.

“Winning the final regular season game is big for everybody. It’s big for morale, it’s big for the guys coming out and scoring nine runs the way we did. I think for sure today’s momentum’s going to carry over and we’re going to use this going forward,” Melton said.

Oregon State players have been open about the fact that hosting a regional and being in position to host a super regional is one of the team’s goals for the season. The team lost in the deciding game of the regionals last year on the road. There would be an advantage to playing that game at Goss Stadium. This past weekend, Oregon State drew 12,121 fans to Goss Stadium for the three-game series against UCLA, a new program record.

Melton thinks the Pac-12 tournament is an opportunity to secure that goal.

“We want to go and win that. Obviously, with the seeding, the selection show after that, I mean if we win that we have a really good chance to be a top-eight seed. That was kind of, the last two weekends, up in the air,” Melton said, adding that ultimately it doesn’t matter to the players where the games are held. “I don’t think we’re too worried about that. We’re going to go play our baseball no matter where we go. I think it’s an opportunity to grow and keep getting right going through the tournament there.”

Oregon State coach Mitch Canham is certain the team views the conference tournament as an opportunity and not just as an additional obligation in a long season.

“I know these guys, they’re not going into a tournament saying ‘Hey, let’s just get through this thing.’ No, we want to go out and win,” Canham said.

He also thinks it will be useful to experience tournament pressure prior to the start of the regionals.

“Tournament mode is different. You’re out there to win every stinking game. And I think going into regionals and supers and Omaha, having that kind of environment is different than just a weekend series. You’ve got to be ready every day and then you start facing that elimination feel. If you lose, how do you respond to it? I think it’s a great thing,” Canham said.

In addition to the offensive breakout in the final game against UCLA, the Beavers were also buoyed by the strong outing by starter Jake Pfennigs. An injury limited his availability early in the season, but he has been very effective when he has pitched and leads the team with a 1.63 ERA.

Pfennigs pitched 61/3 innings against UCLA, his longest outing of the year. A tournament setting puts tremendous pressure on a pitching staff and having the 6-foot-7 right-hander available gives Canham more options.

Cooper Hjerpe leads the team with 14 starts this year and freshman Jacob Kmatz has started 13 games.

Sophomore Jaren Hunter recorded nine starts and Pfennigs made eight starts.

Hunter (2-1, 3.43 ERA) will get the start on Wednesday against Washington. The Huskies will start Jared Engman (4-5, 3.95 ERA).

The double-elimination tournament begins at 9 a.m. Wednesday and will conclude with a championship game at 7 p.m. Sunday. Games will be televised live on Pac-12 Network.

Oregon enters the inaugural Pac-12 baseball tournament in as advantageous a position as possible for the No. 4 seed.

The Ducks (35-21, 18-12 Pac-12) are coming off sweeping No. 5 seed Arizona (35-21, 16-14) and will face the Wildcats again in the opening game of the conference tournament at Scottsdale Stadium on Wednesday (9 a.m., Pac-12 Network). UO will also play either top-seeded Stanford or No. 8 seed Arizona State, both of which it beat during regular season road series.

“Obviously we’ve been on the other end of that equation this season, of playing a team a consecutive amount of times,” outfielder Tanner Smith said, referring to UO’s 0-4 week of games against Oregon State earlier this month. “We do know it’s tough, but we are looking forward to it.”

Oregon hit .306 in Pac-12 play, including .314 in last weekend’s series against Arizona, and enters the conference tournament ranked eighth nationally in hits (606), 18th in batting average (.307) and 21st in fielding percentage (.978).

Arizona is a free-swinging team, with the most strikeouts in the Pac-12, and has a team ERA of 5.28 in league play. Oregon struck out 29 UA hitters last weekend and will attempt to replicate those results on Wednesday.

“Arizona is always a good program,” Oregon coach Mark Wasikowski said. “I got a chance to coach there for 10 years; I know the program very, very well. I know (Arizona coach) Chip Hale very well. He’s a legend in that community and they’re a good program and we’re looking forward to playing them again.”

In the double-elimination tournament, Oregon will either play the loser of Stanford and Arizona State at 9 a.m. Thursday or the winner at 4:45 p.m. that afternoon.