Doc, yes it would be more practical and likely less expensive but everything I've read and the other two twin planes that I am building with brushless are all with two escs. As I understand it brushless motors have three wires so that info such as timing can be transmitted back to the esc and two motors would not be timed correctly by one esc. I hate to put incorrect info in a forum so I really hope someone else answers this question better than I. Maybe the best way to find out would be to call Castle Creations. They are among the best in quality and customer service. www.castlecreations.com
I spoke to them recently about a P-38 I'm setting up. Needless to say an esc is required for each motor. 4 motor plane must have 4 escs. Most people will also tell you that you must not power the receiver with two escs. The power line is the red line among the three small wires going from the esc to the receiver. You'll want a Y harness to connect both escs into the receiver but on one of the escs you will want to either pull the red wire out of the housing it is in or cut it so that both are not powering the receiver. HOWEVER, castle says that all of their escs can be put in parallel and run to the receiver without having to snip a power line. Other escs may or may not have this capability. Horizonhobby told me yesterday the eflite 20A esc was fine in parallel without snipping a line but the guy didn't sound like he knew for sure.
Now for the battery secret.
I've bought the expensive Thunder Powers and have not been unhappy with performance. I've bought Dymondmodelsports lipos and saved money but got a crappy battery with rotten performance. Then stumbled onto www.commonsenserc.com through one of the guys at our all electric club. The performance numbers they give are right on the money or conservative if anything. Their 3 cell 2100ma 15C packs perform identical to my Polyquest 2100ma 20C packs. Their best deal is a 3 cell pack at 2000 ma at 8C. It will truly put out 16Amps continuously and burst to 24A in between. Two of these packs are $42 ($21 ea). This is what I'll power this plane with.