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Friday, May 16, 2008

Not In Yet, But In Control

Ohio State and Iowa split Friday's doubleheader meaning the Buckeyes are fifth heading into the final day of Big Ten conference play.

Box Scores: Game One Game Two

According to OhioStateBuckeyes.com, Ohio State remains in fifth place in the standings, one-half game ahead of Northwestern and Indiana. These three teams are in contention for the final two Big Ten tourney berths, but Ohio State is in the driver’s seat. Any combination of a Buckeye win or a Northwestern or Indiana loss will put the Buckeyes into the tourney.

Friday, the Buckeyes didn't struggle in a 12-2 victory. After collecting only five hits and stranding six runners Thursday in a 4-3 loss to Iowa, Ohio State wasted no time in getting on the board, jumping all over Iowa starter Nick Erdman. The Buckeyes collected five hits and scored four runs in the second inning, including RBI singles by Cory Kovanda and Tyler Engle, and an RBI double from Tony Kennedy. Another run scored on a wild pitch.

Iowa pulled within two in the bottom of the second. The Buckeyes got one of Iowa ’s two runs back in the top of the third as Engle had his second RBI single of the day to score Cory Rupert, who had singled. Ohio State put the game away in the fourth by scoring six more runs off four hits, two errors and an Iowa balk to stake DeLucia to an 11-2 lead.

Rupert and the bottom of the batting order sparked the Buckeyes. Rupert had three hits and three runs scored. Dan Burkhart had a couple of hits and two runs scored. Kovanda had a hit and two runs scored and Engle had two hits, two RBI and a run scored.

DeLucia went 5.0 innings and allowed seven hits and the two earned runs. He struck out two and walked two and improved his record to 3-3 on the season and 24-13 for his Ohio State career.

In the nightcap, Iowa won 7-4. Kurtis Muller hit a grand slam home run in the first inning and Caleb Curry hit a two-run homer in the second to build a 6-0 lead off Ohio State starter Dean Wolosiansky. The Buckeyes got a run in the third and another in the fourth to cut the lead to 6-2, but Iowa scored an unearned run with two outs in their half of the fourth to build a five-run cushion at 7-2.

Justin Miller’s third hit of the game – a two-run home run in the sixth inning – pulled the Buckeyes within the three-run final score. It was Miller’s team-leading fourth home run of the year and it increased his team-leading RBI total to 60.

The Buckeyes ended up leaving the bases loaded in the sixth as reliever Brock Alberts got the final out of the inning on a pop fly to short. Alberts then shut the Buckeyes down in the seventh for his first save of the year.

Ohio State is now 29-24 overall and 14-15 in the Big Ten. The teams conclude conference play Saturday at 2:05 p.m.

7 comments:

rockybuckeye said...

I have a bade feeling. Our bats are on an every other weekend type deal.

vs PSU 20 runs
vs Minnesota 23 runs
at MSU 9 runs
vs Purdue 17 runs
at NW 36 runs
at Michigan 6 runs
vs Illinois 27 runs
at Iowa?

rockybuckeye said...

Bad* feeling is what I was going for.

But who knows, maybe DeLucia can do what he did last week, and for Wolo he can show last week was the exception to the rule.

I do know it is not a good sign when our longest win streak of the season consists of 3 games. Granted we're not that much over .500 so you'll have that, but it doesn't speak too well for our chances in the near future.

BuckeyeFan16 said...

Pretty shocking way to lose the game last night. It should not have come down to that situation. We failed to execute on key situations earlier in the game. Especially in the 7th, when Hurley leads off with a 2B. We failed to get him in from 2B with nobody out. It came back to haunt us, as that would have put us up by two runs. Only five hits total. We need to step it up today in our DH.

BaseballBucks33 said...

Yeah we have been leaving a lot of runners on with no outs all year.That drives me nuts.I can't believe BT did not bunt last night after Zack 2B in the 7th.We have been having bad AB's after a lead off runner gets on.That is what is killing us.We need to get some big hits together today.

RB,i hope you are wrong about scoring runs today.We need these last 3 games real bad of course.
16,Zack has had a very nice season and is going to be a great Buckeye ball player in the years to come.

BuckeyeFan16 said...

After our loss in game two of the DH tonight, where do we stand in terms of making the tournament? Can we still make it if we lose our final game to Iowa, or do we have to win?

Anonymous said...

Looks like we are in already...no more wins needed

Going into Friday we were 5th with a one game lead over NU and MSU. NU and OSU both split so the we are still one up one NU, but MSU lost two so we are now 2 games up on MSU with one game to go. So even if we lose and MSU and NU win on Friday we would be tied for 5th with NU and MSU would be 7th.

Anonymous said...

I stand corrected, while MSU, OSU and NU have been losing this weekend Indiana has been winning and they could sneak by all of them!

So today, if we win we could finish as high has 4th (with a Ill loss) or if we lose we can finish as low as 7th (with a Ind and Nu wins).