CORVALLIS — The inspiration arrived in Travis Bazzana’s locker before he played his first game with the Oregon State Beavers.

It was a small piece of paper, strategically placed by Darwin Barney so the kid from Australia couldn’t miss it, and it contained three numbers:

238.

They represented the record number of hits Barney produced during his illustrious college career in Corvallis, a fabled figure that outlasted Conforto and Madrigal and Rutschman and every other distinguished player who came through the vaunted program after him. A number that, some thought, might never be broken.

“He put the number up in my locker,” Bazzana said. “He was chirping me, saying, basically, ‘You won’t break this. You can’t break this.’ But, really, he was also saying it as motivation, because he thought that I had the talent to give it a run.”

Bazzana has rewritten the Oregon State record book during his historic junior season, shattering numerous career and single-season marks that have stood for years, if not decades. But as the All-America second baseman has waltzed past Wilson, eclipsed Ellsbury, toppled Gerber and Jarvis and walked beyond Rutschman and Forrester, there is one record he has been chasing the most, one he says means more than any other.

The one noted on that piece of paper placed in his locker three years ago.

“I never set out to break these records,” Bazzana said. “I always thought about them. I knew about them. They were in the back of my mind. My goals were more specific than that, more day-to-day. But the one that I definitely had aspirations on from the get-go was Darwin’s hits record, because he planted that seed, and I was around him every day. It was sort of something we talked about, so I decided way back then, I wanted to be the all-time hits leader here.”

With six games and two weekends left in a regular season for the ages, Bazzana finally is in position to achieve his lofty ambition.

The Golden Spikes Award candidate, who leads the Pac-12 in batting average (.428), home runs (26), RBIs (59), runs scored (69) and walks (61), enters the weekend with 235 career hits. His next will tie Jacoby Ellsbury for second place and leave him just two shy of equaling Barney.

• • •

It was during a meaningless exhibition game in the fall of 2021, against Linn-Benton Community College, when Barney first started to believe that Oregon State’s touted infielder from across the globe might just be something special.

The Beavers had a loaded team, featuring the likes of Cooper Hjerpe, Jacob Melton, Wade Meckler and Justin Boyd. But as they entered the final inning of the fall ball outing, they were trailing their vastly inferior opponent by a run. Bazzana, who had earned West Coast League MVP honors the previous summer after an incredible season with the Corvallis Knights, wasn’t having it.

“I just remember him looking at everyone in the dugout heading into the last inning,” Barney said, “and he goes: ‘Guys, we are not going to lose this game.’”

The Beavers rallied, tying the game and sending Bazzana to the plate with a runner on base. The rookie ripped a hit to deliver the go-ahead run, backing up his prediction.

“I’ll never forget it,” said Barney, who was an assistant coach at the time. “When he got on base, he stared into the dugout, raised his arms, and just had this look, like, ‘Seeeeee!’ That’s the kind of guy he is. He backs up what he says, plays the game with an amazing passion and holds himself to a super high standard.”

It set the table for a memorable freshman season in which Bazzana hit .306 with six homers, 16 doubles, 44 RBIs and 58 runs scored, while being named to multiple Freshman All-America teams. Along the way, behind the scenes, the coaching staff knew they had a once-in-a-generation talent, so they leaned hard on him.

Bazzana’s work ethic, passion and quest to be the best are legendary in the program, rivaled only by renowned grinder Meckler. He pushes himself as hard as anyone, studies the game more than anyone and talks baseball as long as anyone will listen. Over the years, Bazzana has given multiple presentations to the team, detailing at different times the art of hitting, the mechanics of pitching — focusing on, in part, induced vertical break and how to use off-speed pitches — and, more recently, about championship habits.

But, Barney said, when Bazzana was a wide-eyed freshman, he “needed a nudge.”

So Barney provided it.

They worked together weekly on his fielding, so Bazzana could stay in the infield and increase his draft stock. They talked daily about his swing, so he avoided complacency. And they rapped regularly about what it meant to be a leader, what it looked like to train like a champion and what it takes to become a Big Leaguer.

“Expectations were always really high with him,” Barney said. “And we were really hard on him. We had him in the office all the time, talking about what we needed from him, how he could improve, how he could help the team. He said his goals were to win a national championship and that’s what our vision was, too. So it was about teaching him that he was a big part of that and showing him what that looked like.”

Most things on the field come naturally for Bazzana, a gifted athlete and baseball savant. But, in a weird way, that became a hurdle. Bazzana was determined to be a leader, to one day become the face of the program, and he was constantly probing coaches for tips about how to motivate and drive teammates.

Barney and other OSU coaches responded by saying he needed to, among other things, become a “selfish team player.” Did Bazzana always need to work harder than everyone else to succeed? Not really. But going above and beyond behind the scenes not only would make him better, it also would help the team, setting the standard and providing inspiration.

“Most of our conversations were hard and they were real,” Barney said. “But he took them in stride and handled them well. The talks were always different. But some of them focused on, ‘Look, some of these things are easy for you. But maybe they’re not as easy for the next guy. Maybe you need to take extra reps even though you don’t need them, just to set the example for everyone else.’ He was very open and definitely took our talks the right way and took them to heart.”

Three years later, no player is more respected, more admired and more followed inside the Oregon State locker room.

Bazzana has a unique understanding of the history of the program and its tradition, and it is not lost on him that decades of players and coaches before him created the environment that helped nurture his success. As he has rewritten the OSU record books and etched his name alongside the greats that he watched admiringly from thousands of miles away as a kid, Bazzana has done so humbly, with reverence for a place he loves.

When asked about his record chase last month, before he started checking them off one after the other, Bazzana spoke about sharing the success with teammates and inspiring future generations of Beavers players.

“I hope the days that I break records we win,” Bazzana said in April. “And I hope that I get to cherish those moments with my teammates. I hope they spark freshmen and younger guys to go chase a great career in an Oregon State uniform, and also motivate people back home — kids in Australia — to go be great in whatever they’re doing, to set unprecedented levels of success in whatever they do.”

• • •

Jim Wilson had just settled into his car with his wife last Sunday when she made an unexpected announcement.

“Turn on the game, Travis is up to bat,” Wilson said, recalling his wife’s words.

“She changed the radio station,” he said, “and two pitches later, he hit the home run.”

Bazzana crushed a 2-1 pitch to deep right field in the first inning at Bailey-Brayton Field in Pullman, Washington, giving him 22 homers this season. And just like that, a 42-year-old record had been toppled and Wilson became the latest Oregon State great to lose his place atop the Beavers record book.

Wilson hit .336 with 21 home runs and 62 RBIs during a magical season in 1982, and his home run mark remained the gold standard at Oregon State for more than four decades. Trevor Larnach threatened it in 2018, belting 19 homers. Adley Rutschman chased it a year later, finishing with 17. Melton matched Rutschman’s 17 in 2022. And Gavin Turley hit a freshman-record 16 last season.

Then came 2024 and Bazzana’s unprecedented season.

He broke Ellsbury’s record for runs scored on March 19. He broke Joe Gerber and Andy Jarvis’ career home run record — and Jarvis’ career total bases record — on April 9. He broke Rutschman’s record for career walks on April 30. He even broke an unofficial record, blasting leadoff home runs in four consecutive games. And Bazzana is on pace to surpass even more, including career records in doubles, triples, slugging percentage and stolen bases, and single-season records in batting average, walks, total bases and slugging percentage.

When his college career ends this summer — he’s widely expected to be a top-five pick in the 2024 MLB draft — Bazzana will be remembered as the best player in program history.

“I’m not really surprised, honestly,” Wilson said of Bazzana snatching his home run crown. “I was talking to someone early in the season and he said, ‘Hey, your record is going down this year. Gavin Turley is going to break it.’ I said, ‘Uh, no, you’ve got the wrong guy. Bazzana is the guy.’ I just thought before the year, this might be the year it goes down.”

Wilson said he hasn’t given his record much thought over the years, outside of when people bring it up. But the significance hit home recently when he told his daughter that his reign as the Beavers home run king wouldn’t last much longer.

“My daughter said, ‘Oh, that’s too bad,’” Wilson said. “’You don’t know how many times I’ve told people that my dad is the home run record-holder at Oregon State.’ It’s not something I think about, but considering what the program has become and how it’s nationally recognized as a blue blood college baseball program, it does give you a sense of pride. It’s such a respected program that when my daughter says, ‘My dad is the home run record-holder,’ that means something.’”

The allure of the program struck Bazzana years ago, when he visited Corvallis on a recruiting trip. He had been an Oregon State fan for years — he used to watch grainy YouTube clips of Barney and Joey Wong turning double plays at the College World Series — and as he roamed campus, he snapped pictures to remember his first tour.

Only two of the pictures remain today: A snapshot of the championship trophies and a photo of a gigantic mural in the players’ lounge that, among other things, displays a list of all the OSU record-holders.

He’ll have to snap another keepsake after the season.

Because three years later — fueled by those three numbers that once hung in his locker — Bazzana has rewritten the list of records with his own name.

“It was a challenge to him, I had to mess with him a little to drive him to do something great,” Barney said, revealing why he put that piece of paper in Bazzana’s locker. “I feel like everything he was expecting of himself is happening. To watch his development and to see what he’s doing this year has been really cool. He’s a special player and a special person.

“I’ve had (the hits record) for a while, and if anyone is going to take it down, obviously, I would love for a guy like Bazz, who I worked with, sweated with, went through the grind with, to do it. There’s not going to be too many lists when he’s done that don’t have his name at the top.”

— Joe Freeman | jfreeman@oregonian.com | 503-294-5183 | @BlazerFreeman | Subscribe to The Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories.