Cornhuskers lose their first series of the season

Will Bolt and Steve Owens both hoped that their starting pitchers – Drew Christo and Christian Coppola – would get on top of batters in the count and give them some length in the game. The two righthanders were very similar in that they sported low-90’s fastballs, solid sliders, and a change-up. Unfortunately, neither of them had great stuff and both teams were lucky the game didn’t get away from them early on.

The first pitch of the game gave one a sense that Nebraska may pick up where they left off yesterday in their 16-1 win as Cayden Brumbaugh opened it up with a bunt for a base hit. Coppola was all over the place with his fastball and quickly went almost exclusively to his slider, that broke more like a 12-to-6 curve. Nebraska batters struggle with timing and were not able to get Brumbaugh home.

Christo actually got off to a decent start, striking out Cameron Love, but after Case Sanderson dropped an easy throw at first allowing Trevor Cohen to reach on an error, it seemed that Christo could not get a fastball over the plate. At times he would get ahead in the count and then try to nibble too much, or he would fall behind and serve up a meatball down in the count. He ended up going two innings giving up no runs and two hits, but he faced 12 batters and threw 45 pitches.

Nebraska opened the scoring in the top of the second as Ben Columbus, starting at catcher today, slapped a single the opposite way to continue his hot streak. He advanced to third on a Garrett Anglim walk and a Riley Silva single, scoring on a deep sacrifice fly to rightfield by Cayden Brumbaugh. However, Nebraska failed to capitalize and left two more runners on base against a pitcher struggling to find the strike zone.

The Big Red scored again in the third with Cole Evans getting a lead-off walk and eventually scoring on the second single of the game for Ben Columbus.

With Christo surrendering a walk and giving up an RBI double to Josh Kuroda-Grauer to start the third inning, Nebraska brought in Will Walsh with a runner on and no outs. Walsh got a ground out from Ty Doucette, and then a double play from his defense off the bat of Pete Durocher after walking Troy Santa Maria. With Rutgers now on the board, Nebraska had a 2-1 lead

Nebraska picked up a run in the fourth inning when Dylan Carey smoked a 1-2 breaking ball for his second home run of the weekend, chasing Coppola from the game. He was replaced by Ben Gorski, who not only shut down the Cornhuskers the rest of the way in the fourth, but also put them down in order in the fifth inning and recorded two strikeouts in the sixth before giving way to lefthander Donovan Zsak to start the seventh inning.

Back to the bottom of the fourth, Rutgers roughed up Will Walsh for a couple of runs. Like Christo, Walsh pitched from behind in the count most of the way. He gave up a home run to catcher Jackson Natili with one out. After getting a ground ball out, the top three batters in the Scarlet Knight lineup all got base hits with Cameron Love scoring the tying run. Walsh came out for the fifth, gave up a lead-off single to Santa Maria and then got a couple of outs. Then the bottom fell out for Walsh as he hit the number eight and nine batters back-to-back to fill the bases. Coach Childress brought in righty Evan Borst who walked in the go-ahead run on four pitches. In came Jalen Worthley who got a ground out to end the inning, but after five, Rutgers was up 4-3.

The Scarlet Knights extended their lead to 5-3 in the bottom of the seventh when Johnny Volpe led off with a solo home run off Jalen Worthley. Fortunately, the lefthander from Lincoln East gathered himself and there was no further damage.

Nebraska got a run closer in the top of the eighth with Garrett Anglim getting a hit and working himself around the bases on a couple of wild pitches and a sacrifice fly. But for the fourth time in the game, Nebraska stranded two baserunners.

Rutgers plated an insurance run in their half of the eighth to put the score at 6-4 in favor of the home team. Closer Joey DeChiaro then put Nebraska down in order to finish the game and win the first B1G series for the boys from New Jersey.

Nebraska had plenty of chances today, stranding 10 runners and getting seven free passes from Rutgers pitchers. But just as that is said, Rutgers can claim that they should have won bigger as they left twelve runners on base and got eight free passes from Cornhusker pitching. To call this game ugly would be an understatement.

Stepping back and taking a look, it was not an uncommon Big Ten Sunday game. That said, if Nebraska is going to win the conference and achieve the goals that they have set, a solid Sunday starting pitcher is going to have to emerge. A number of guys have auditioned, and Mason McConnaughey grabbed it in his chance, getting a promotion to Saturday. Someone else needs to step up and take it because what is in place now is not working.

Nebraska starts an eight game homestand on Tuesday, facing Creighton for the second time this season on Tuesday and then taking on Maryland next weekend. The team has lost four of their last five and need to get back in the win column against the Bluejays. First pitch is scheduled for 6:05 at Haymarket Park.

Notes:

· Rutgers is a much better team than what they have shown thus far in the B1G season and will most likely battle their way into the top eight and a spot in the tournament in Omaha.

· Nebraska falls to second in the conference standings behind surprising Illinois. The Cornhuskers do not face the Illini in the regular season this year.

· Josh Kuroda-Grauer is an incredible hitter, leading the B1G with a climbing .444 average. He also has 19 stolen bases, and made a very savvy decision in the bottom of the eighth inning when he tagged up on a deep fly ball to left, moved to third base after the catch, and score a batter later. He’s most definitely the best player in the B1G at the half-way point of the season.

· Cameron Love stole two base hits from the Cornhuskers, laying out and snagging hard hit line drives. His coach calls him the best second baseman in the country. He certainly flashed the leather today.

· Ben Columbus was a bright spot the last two games, getting four hits and driving in six runs. He also had his second career home run. He’s shown he deserves more at-bats.

· Dylan Carey also had a very good weekend, going 4-6 with two home runs and a couple of RBI the last two games.

· The black caps, socks, sleeves and black pinstripe pants have to go. They’ve been worn twice and resulted in a loss and having to come from behind in extra-innings to get a win against cellar-dwelling Northwestern. Get. Rid. Of. Them! On the flip-side, Rutgers had a very clean look today with all-white uni’s, red numerals, and no trim. It was a similar look to the classic L.A. Dodgers uniforms and looked great.