Sunday, March 01, 2009

Sunday Scoreboard Update

March has arrived, but the scores look eerily similar to February's. Here's the scoreboard as of 5:55 p.m.

# 7 Texas 9 Penn State 0
# 25 Michigan 10 Akron 7 (8 inning final)
Indiana 9 Cleveland State 1
Ohio State 21 Connecticut 14
Illinois 3 UT Arlington 2
Southern Illinois 8 Iowa 3
Northeastern 6 Northwestern 4 (Game One)
Northeastern 4 Northwestern 3 (Game Two)
Michigan State @ UNC Wilmington ccd, rain
Purdue @ SE Missouri State, ccd

In-progress: Minnesota 2 Hawai'i 2, 6th inning

What jumps out at me? It's hard not to see the Buckeyes three-touchdown output, matching Michigan's mark from their first game yesterday. The downside is that the OSU pitching, which has been nothing short of stellar, allowed 14 runs to UConn. (The Huskies actually got runs off Drew Rucinski. That has not happened much in '09.)

The usually long-ball starved Bucks clouted seven homers today. Seven. Matt Streng led the Buckeye power game by going yard twice. I'm not sure I expect OSU to suddenly turn to Gorilla Ball, but it had to be a refreshing change of pace for Buckeye fans used to seeing singles and doubles all day long.

The big run total propelled the Buckeyes to a 7-0 start. That's the third best EVER start in Ohio State baseball history.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Penn State got no-hit this afternoon by Texas' Brandon Workman. Workman will become a potential national player of the week candidate in the process. Congratulations, to Mr. Workman. For the Nittany Lions, there are quite a few games left on the schedule. Forget this weekend and move on.

Tomorrow will be an interesting day for Michigan. Will the voters keep Michigan in the polls? I'm not sure a 2-2 mark this weekend will suffice. UM's Ryan LaMarre had four RBI on three hits. Tim Kalczynski homered. Mike Dufek pitched three innings of one-hit, one walk baseball to earn the win.

Indiana's Eric Arnett improved to 2-0 by tossing seven innings of three-hit, one-run baseball. The run was unearned and Arnett gave up only two walks and fanned nine. Freshman DH Alex Dickerson had three hits, including his third home run, and three RBI.

Ben Reeser started for the Illini and worked six innings. Reeser allowed one earned run on six hits and struck out six. John Anderson pitched the final inning to earn the save. Dominic Altobelli drove in two.

Justin Toole had another multiple hit game in Iowa's loss. Toole had two, so did Zach McCool who scored once and had a RBI. Ryan Durant's three hits paced the Hawkeyes.

Northwestern's Paul Sneider had a double and triple in the opening game defeat. The 'Cats led the second game, a seven inning affair, 3-0 in the seventh. Unfortunately, Northeastern scored four times in their last at bat to win. Joe Muraski gave up three hits, two walks and a run over six innings. Muraski struck out seven, but it wasn't enough, as NU's bullpen couldn't close the deal.

All that's left is Minnesota game versus Hawai'i in the Dairy Queen Classic.

I've got to get to work on the All-Weekend Team, if I hope to have one this week. (Not that you care, but I've got a busy schedule over the next five days. Posting may be more erratic than normal. Or not.) Regardless, it's off to review boxscores. Good luck, Gophers.

11:42 p.m. Update

The Gophers score three in the bottom of the ninth to beat Hawai'i, 5-4, and win the Dairy Queen Classic. The Gophers went 3-0 over the weekend to claim their first ever back-to-back DQ title.

2 comments:

Joanna said...

I dunno about the rest of the Big 10 but T. J. Macy (rhp, Penn State) deserves some consideration for making the all-weekend team. He threw a great game yesterday afternoon in Austin. PSU lost 1-0. Macy pitched a complete game. He faced 31 batters and gave up 5 hits (all singles) while striking out 7 and walking 3. He threw 106 pitches by my count. It seems terribly unfair that he could pitch such a nice game, particularly this early in the season, and end up with a 1-run loss.

Chris said...

Ryan LaMarre of Michigan will surely be on it. I'm hard-pressed to think of anyone else who really stood out (in a good way), though.