Waldron carries Huskers to 4-1 win

In a quick game that lasted a little over two hours, the Huskers (9-7, 1-0) found a way to push runners across late in the game to come away with a 4-1 win against the Spartans (3-16, 0-1).

The big story of the day comes from senior pitcher Matt Waldron, whose complete game lifted the Huskers to the win. The only blemish on Waldron's sheet came in the third inning when the Spartans took an early 1-0 lead off of a solo home run to right field by Adam Procter. Waldron proved tough to hit the rest of the way, however, only allowing a single hit for the remainder of the game.

The Husker bats didn't really get going until the bottom half of the sixth when Aaron Palensky scored Mojo Hagge on an RBI double to right field, tying the game up at one.

The Huskers took the lead and added some insurance runs in the seventh when third basemen Cam Chick lead the inning off with an infield single where he would later score after a walk by Angelo Altavilla. The scoring continued for the Huskers after Palensky hit a sacrifice fly to center field, scoring Alex Henwood and capping off the inning with an RBI single to right field off the bat of Keegan Watson to put the Huskers ahead for good, 4-1.

Starting pitcher Matt Waldron was lights out today against the Spartans. His nine innings marked the first complete game for a Husker pitcher this season and the first since 2017, leading to a 1-0 record for the Huskers in conference play. Waldron finished his complete game only allowing two hits and a lone run coming off of a third-inning home run from Michigan State's Adam Procter.

Not only was Waldron impressive against the Spartans, but he also recorded career strikeout No. 192, moving him into the lone spot for tenth on the Huskers all-time leaders in strikeouts.

"I would say after [the solo home run], that hurts," Waldon recalled. "But there's only one way to get out of that and that's the next batter. I think I kind of got a little upset at that actually and started to fill up the zone a little more but I kind of feel like, after that inning, I forgot about it and really, once those hits came, it helped a lot."

Freshman infielder Cam Chick had a strong day at the plate, going 3-for-4 and scoring a run in the Huskers big seventh inning. Chick got the seventh inning started on an infield single to the shortstop and would score four at-bats later to give the Huskers the 2-1 lead.

Aaron Palensky was also big in the Huskers win, batting in two of Nebraska's four runs on the day. In the bottom of the sixth, with the Huskers trailing 1-0, Palensky drilled a double into right-center, scoring Hagge and putting the Huskers on the board to tie the game.

Between the two, Chick and Palensky accounted for four of the eight hits and three of the four runs, providing the spark for the offense.

The Huskers (9-7, 1-0) will play Game 2 of a doubleheader against Michigan State (3-16, 0-1) today with first pitch set for approximately 6:10 PM.

Starting pitchers for Game 2 will be Nate Fisher (2-1, 3.15 ERA) for Nebraska and Mitchell Tyranski (0-3, 4.67 ERA) for the Spartans.