OMAHA, Neb. – The second-seeded Nebraska Cornhuskers won the nightcap at the Big Ten Baseball Championship Saturday, getting past the Michigan Wolverines 6-4 before a largely red-clad crowd that showed up despite the game starting at 11 p.m. CDT.
Case Sanderson propelled the Huskers, going 3-for-4 with a double, a triple, a run scored and three RBIs, and Rhett Stokes had a pair of RBIs for Nebraska in the win.
Nebraska got on the board in the bottom of the first when Sanderson tripled down the right field line, allowing Dylan Carey and Jeter Worthley to score and give the Cornhuskers a 2-0 lead.
Michigan tied the game in the top of the fourth, getting one run when Evan Haeger’s ground out to first base allowed Colby Turner to score. Cade Ladehoff followed Haeger with a double to right center, scoring Brayden Jefferis to tie the game at two apiece.
In the bottom of the inning, Rhett Stokes singled to left, scoring Drew Grego and Sanderson to re-establish a two-run Nebraska lead.
The lead lasted just two innings, as Michigan’s Matthew Ossenfort hit a two-run homer in the top of the seventh to tie the game for the Wolverines.
But Case Sanderson wasn’t done, hitting a two-run single in the bottom of the seventh to give Nebraska a 6-4 lead, scoring Worthley and Rhett Stokes to make it 6-4.
Nebraska starter Carson Jasa went six innings, allowing four runs on four hits and striking out eight, and relievers Tyler Horn and J’Shawn Unger combined to throw three hitless, scoreless innings to preserve the win.
NCAA Tournament Implications – With the loss, Michigan fell to No. 52 in the RPI as of Saturday morning, putting them on the bubble for an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
Weather and the Schedule – The start of this game was originally scheduled for 5 p.m. CDT, and midway through the game between UCLA and Purdue, the Big Ten announced that the third quarterfinal game between Nebraska and Michigan would begin at 11 p.m. CDT if the game between UCLA and Purdue ended by 10:20 p.m. Several members of the media were keeping track of the time as UCLA batted in the ninth, and the general consensus was that Levu crossed the plate to end the game at 10:19:47 p.m., making the curfew by 13 seconds. The game started exactly 40 minutes after the previous game ended, with the first pitch coming at 11 p.m. CDT.
