The Nebraska baseball team won its fourth straight game on Sunday afternoon and managed to move to within just one game of first place in the Big Ten Conference in the process. The Huskers dominated the Rutgers Scarlet Knights 9-3 while B1G leading Maryland suffered a setback with their 6-2 loss against the Illinois Fighting Illini. The win for the Cornhuskers continues a Run towards the end of the season that has meant the team looks like they are getting ready to secure an at-large bid to the post season if they can’t complete the comeback all the way and get themselves an automatic bid.
Maryland, meanwhile is not playing poorly, they’re just not playing well enough to keep the Huskers at bay for very much longer.
Nebraska baseball and the Mojo Hagge show
True freshman Mojo Hagge has had a bit of an up and down season so far, but on Saturday, he showed the talent that made Darin Erstad trust the young man enough to put him in the starting lineup. Hitting just .263 on the season, that average went up quite a few ticks when he went 4 for 5 with an RBI and a run scored.
The right fielder might not be slugging much (.336) but he is managing to get on base at a pretty decent clip (.363) and he isn’t striking out all that much. It’s more the fact that he’s managed to appear in 39 games despite being a true freshman that has Nebraska fans thinking he might be a big part of the school’s future.
Nebraska baseball taking care of business
It’s true that the Scarlet Knights are not a Big Ten juggernaut but there are few teams in the conference that qualify for that title. The win brought plenty to get excited about for Huskers fans who are looking for the team to be playing its best baseball as it heads towards the end of the regular season.
Starting pitcher Derek Burkamper is yet another Cornhusker who has had a bit of an up and down season, but he managed to pitch quite well thanks to 6.1 innings pitched and just two earned runs. Burkamper also struck out five while walking just one and allowing eight hits.
Even better than Burkamper was reliever Jake McSteen who closed out the game thanks to 2.2 innings pitched while allowing just two hits and striking out one.
While McSteen did allow a run, it was clearly in a mop-up role where that run wasn’t going to hurt them in the slightest. Now Nebraska is poised to sweep the series against Rutgers and make a real run towards the top of the Big Ten conference baseball standings
