Disastrous pitching change dooms Nebraska in series loss
Friday and Saturday, Nebraska used just two pitchers out of the bullpen in working a series split into Sunday’s rubber match.
With a 4-2 lead in the fifth inning, the Huskers decided to pivot away from the pressure-inducing pace of starter Matt Warren - and eventually paid the price.
Rutgers scored six straight runs, Nebraska couldn’t continue a strong hitting day from the top of the order and the Huskers dropped a crucial series with an 8-4 loss to the Scarlet Knights on Sunday.
Warren moved between pitches at a pace quicker than he had shown all season. The senior right-hander worked spotless innings in the first, second and fourth, with the only mark against him being a two-run frame that featured two infield hits.
With two outs and a runner on third in the fifth, the Huskers went with junior lefty Jake McSteen out of the bullpen. In the next eight batters against the Husker southpaw, Rutgers would draw a walk, hit two homers, bring in five runs on five hits and squeeze a sacrifice bunt, all in the span of two outs.
“Right there, we go with our most experienced and freshest arm,” head coach Darin Erstad said in his postgame radio show on the Husker Sports Network. “Matt Warren had tended, in that situation, to start losing his stuff - which he was - and like I said, we went with our freshest and most experienced arm and it just didn't work out for us.”
After the RU scoring run, Nebraska couldn’t regain any of the offensive mojo it showed early on.
The game started in promising fashion for the Husker offense, getting singles from the first two batters before eventually leaving the bases loaded in a scoreless frame.
NU posted its first runs in the top of the third, snatching the first lead on a two-run homer from senior Scott Schreiber, his 13th bomb of the year. Rutgers responded with a two-RBI single in the bottom side, but Nebraska would break the tie again with RBIs from Jesse Wilkening and Luke Roskam in the top of the fifth.
At the halfway point of the contest, the 1-2-3-4 hitters in the Nebraska lineup were a scorching 7-for-10 on the day. The Huskers would knock just two hits the rest of the afternoon.
As Nebraska clung to a 4-2 lead, Warren let go of a full-count walk to lead off the bottom of the fifth. The Husker senior worked around it and notched the first two outs as RU sophomore Kevin Welsh made his way to third.
After the pitching change, the two-out, fifth-inning rally against the Husker bullpen helped Rutgers to a blistering 5-for-13 clip (.385) in two-out situations. Meanwhile, the Huskers notched just one hit all game with two down in an inning.
“The situation is what it is and we just haven't been able to put together good baseball for a consistent period,” Erstad said. “They won the bullpen game today and those are the kind of games that we've typically won.
"We were on the wrong end of it again today, but we're going to have to get on the plane, get back and try to find a way to figure this out.”
The loss drops Nebraska to 4-9 in the Big Ten and puts the defending conference champion in a huge hole to even make it back to the league tournament, for which it is the host. Nebraska hasn’t missed the Big Ten tournament since joining the league in the 2012 season.
The Huskers welcome non-conference foe Nevada to Haymarket Park next weekend before finishing out against Maryland, Indiana and Illinois in Big Ten play.