On Friday, the ‘Cats and Hoosiers faced off in the annual ‘Cats Classic, where Northwestern baseball is played at the iconic Wrigley Field. Indiana won handedly, 9-2 amidst some May snow, handing the Wildcats their tenth consecutive Big Ten loss. Northwestern had been swept by Purdue, Michigan and Minnesota the past three weekends and was watching its contention for the Big Ten Tournament slip through the cracks.
Late Friday night, the ‘Cats packed up and departed the Friendly Confines, headed back
north to Evanston, desperate for answers and wins. They found a pair of each at Rocky and Berenice Miller Park.
Game 2: Northwestern 7, Indiana 4
On Saturday, the Hoosiers jumped out the gate, scoring in the first and adding another two in the third off the sophomore Matt Kouser.
In the bottom half of the third inning, Ryan Kucherack unleashed a bases-clearing double, plating Jack Lausch, Owen Mcelfatrick and Nick Barron to even the score. Lausch then broke the tie in the fifth, launching a two-run homer to right, his team leading 11th of the year.
After the third, Kouser found his golden tempo, tossing three shutout innings and only giving up one hit across 11 batters.
In the bottom half of the seventh, Kucherack laced an RBI single up the middle to break the tie and place Lausch on third. Only a few pitches later, NU manufactured another run via the double-steal: Kucherak’s delayed steal drew a throw to second base from Hoosiers catcher T.J. Schuyler. Indiana second baseman Landen Fry intercepted the throw just as Lausch broke for the plate on the designed play. Fry readied to fire home, but fumbled the ball in his glove, allowing Northwestern’s seventh run of the game to score. The Hoosiers settled for the easier out, tagging the trail runner in Kucherak who remained in limbo between first and second.
On the bump, first-year and Illinois native Jake Rifenburg finished the job, going three innings and allowing only one run. The ‘Cats took the contest 7-4, and, for the first time since April 5, took down a Big Ten opponent.
Game 3: Northwestern 9, Indiana 6
With the Hoosiers only one game ahead of the Wildcats in the Big Ten standings, Sunday proved to be a crucial rubber match.
Alex Grant got the ball for Northwestern, making his second start of the year amidst a strong stretch as a reliever. Unfortunately for Grant, Hoosiers catcher Hogan Denny led off the game with a bomb to left, immediately putting Indiana on top. The ‘Cats answered right away in the bottom of the first with an RBI single from Jay Slater.
In the second, the Northwestern bats stayed hot. A single from Jake Yang and a walk from McElfatrick led to a first pitch home run mashed by Lausch to put the Wildcats up three. Two batters later, Ruiz crushed a homer of his own, tying Kucherack with his team leading 38th RBI on the season.
Jake Hanley tried to get some momentum started for the Hoosiers with a solo blast in the third, but a sac fly from Slater and a solo homer from McElfatrick extended the Northwestern lead to 8-3 by the end of the seventh.
Drew Dickson, the Wildcats saves leader, came in to replace Grant in the fourth and hurled a strong 3.2 innings, not surrendering a single hit. In the eighth, Indiana cut the lead to two courtesy of a hit by pitch, RBI groundout and run-scoring double. A couple minutes later, however, Barron put the nail in the coffin with a shot to left field, rounding the bases for the eighth time this season.
The ‘Cats struggled defensively, making three errors, but prevented any of them turning into Indiana runs. James Whitaker recorded his first career save as the Wildcats took the rubber match 9-6, making it their first series win against Indiana in Evanston since 2006.
Northwestern isn’t quite out of the Big Ten race just yet, but they’ll have to capitalize on its final two Big Ten series. After a midweek tilt with Illinois State on Tuesday, May 5 at 3:30 p.m. CT., the ‘Cats will ship out to Champaign this weekend to visit the Fighting Illini. then come back home for their season finale against Rutgers, who currently possess the final spot in the conference tournament.
The Wildcats are still within striking distance, only two games back of the Scarlet Knights, but they’ll need to claw their way up through some tougher competition if they want to continue their season beyond May 16.
