Nebraska Baseball Can’t Overcome Early Big Inning at Illinois

· Yahoo Sports

The Friday night starts have been an issue for the Huskers of late. Really only the Indiana series opener has gone the way Nebraska wanted out of the last 6 Fridays. They’ve had some big time comebacks, but living that life will eventually get you burned by a less talented team. “I didn’t have us in the right frame of mind to start,” said a frustrated coach Will Bolt in the post game. “Not even close to good enough to win on a Friday night.”

The Huskers went quietly to start the game against Illinois starter Regan Hall. Hall needed only 9 pitches to turn the game over to his offense.

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Cooper Katskee toed the rubber for the second time as Nebraska’s Friday night starter. His rough start against USC overcome by some offensive heroics and Trojan blunders. Tonight would start as most Katskee starts do, with an early home run, this time to Illinois center fielder Jack Zebig. Then Katskee usually settles down, not tonight, however.

After another quick Husker top of the inning, Illinois got their first two batters aboard via a single and hit by pitch. That forced Katskee to have to pitch under constant pressure again. He escape without giving up a run, but was obviously not himself and just barely hanging on. The Husker coaches knew they needed to get a few more innings out of Katskee to avoid taxing their bullpen on the series opener, so they sent him back out for the third inning, hoping he would right himself, like he has numerous times.

Nebraska finally showed some life in the third as Josh Overbeek drew a full count walk, as he seems to every game. After a Drew Grego strikeout, Rhett Stokes singled to right to put runners on the corners. With a full count on Mac Moyer, Stokes took off for second base. Moyer struck out, and Illinois ran “fire” with the short stop jumping in front of the base to grab the ball. Overbeek had started for home, and the short stop gunned him down to end the inning. Opportunity squandered.

Illinois rode that defensive momentum into their half of the third. Back to back singles were followed by a pop-out. That brought up the Illini’s best hitter in freshman AJ Putty. A sharp single to right brought in a run. Katskee then walked the bases loaded. He came back with a big strikeout for out number two.

A ground ball to third seemed to end the inning with minimal damage. But as Overbeek fielded the ball, and took a step toward the base for an inning ending force out, the ball dropped out of the web of his glove, and the runner beat him to the base as he tried to grab the ball off the ground. E5, run scored. Katskee battled catcher Will Johannes for a lengthy at bat, and on the 9th pitch, Katskee threw a curveball to try and drop it into the zone, a pitch that hadn’t worked well all night, and Johannes obliterated it into the sunset. 7-0 Illini, and Katskee mercifully was pulled.

Nebraska finally got to Hall in the 5th. A sharp single by Will Jesske was followed by a Jett Buck double. Jesske, still not 100% running, held at 3rd. Overbeek hit a line shot that seemed destined for the right center gap and 2 runs, but the second baseman climbed the ladder and snatched it out of the air, saving a 2 run double. A Drew Grego sac fly pushed one run across, getting NU on the board.

The Huskers scored again in the 6th. Jeter Worthley hit a popup over first base that the first baseman lost in the sky and it bounced on the turf. Worthley ran it out to second base and in the scorebook shows up as a standard double. Case Sanderson drove him home with an RBI single to center.

The inning continued as Dylan Carey reached on an error by the third baseman, then the Huskers caught a huge break as it seemed to be a double play, but Jesske was able to leg it out and beat the throw, and upon review, the defender completely missed touching second base. The bases were loaded. Jett Buck drove in Sanderson with an RBI single. Then Overbeek hit a sacrifice fly to bring in Carey. Grego walked to load the bases. After a bad second strike call, Stokes had no choice but to swing at anything, and struck out, stranding three. The lead was cut to 7-4.

The Illini responded in the bottom of the inning. Jalen Worthley walked the leadoff batter, which is always a recipe for disaster, and he and Ty Horn combined to give up 3 runs on 3 hits, as Illinois put the game out of reach, at 10-4

The Huskers added the final run of the game in the 7th, as Mac Moyer kept his reached-base streak alive at 41 with a single, and came around to score on a Carey single. Hall finally exited the game after that inning, having thrown 117 pitches and held the Husker offense, that had come in slugging the ball all over the field, to just 2 extra base hits, both doubles, and one of those should have been an easy pop out to the first baseman.

What can Nebraska do from here to right the Friday night starting woes? Do they do another shuffle of the pitching staff? Or go back to Ty Horn who had an unreal first week as a reliever, but has struggled since? Or do they continue with what they have, knowing they have to take care of the weakness before it gets to a ridiculous 7-0 score? It’s a hard thing for a team that has had so much success on the season up to this point to consider a second major move in just a few weeks.

This game doesn’t take away from the team’s goal of hosting a regional. A series win is all that matters at this point. This team always seems to respond biggest after some adversity. Carson Jasa turning in his usual dominant Saturday afternoon performance will put the team right back on track. Tune in at 2pm on Saturday to see the team try to get back into this series.

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