Hoosiers postseason hopes dashed

The IU baseball team approached this weekend with ideas of stringing together crucial wins in the team's quest to make the Big Ten tournament. With the Michigan Wolverines taking three out of the four games this weekend, however, the Hoosiers' hopes and chances of a tournament berth were dealt a fatal blow. \nAfter a rainout for Friday's game, IU and Michigan played doubleheaders both Saturday and Sunday. Senior pitcher Nick Vitielliss started the weekend on a good note with his first complete game of the season in the full nine-inning game. Seniors Seth Bynum, Kevin Mahar and Ryan Donley all contributed to the scoring in their final home victory, 4-1.\n"It felt good to get a complete game for my final game, but the rest of the weekend didn't go so well," Vitielliss said.\nIn the second game of the series, Michigan edged the Hoosiers in a low-scoring affair that featured just nine hits. Sophomore pitcher Josh Lewis recorded the tough loss despite surrendering only two runs.\n"We have not been playing as good of defense as we needed to," Morgan said. "If you play good defense and your pitchers throw strikes, then you have a chance. Basically those things gave us a chance to win today. We played better today, and they were good ball games. We would have like to squeeze that last one out, it just didn't happen."\nSunday's opening game was also close, but it got away from the Hoosiers in the seventh and final inning as senior pitcher Adam Pegg gave up two earned runs. The Hoosiers were unable to mount a rally as they lost game three by a final score of 6-3. The weekend series concluded with a crushing 16-4 loss.\n"They took advantage of our two errors and ran up eight runs on us," Morgan said.\nThe Wolverines came back in the eighth inning with five more runs to make the deficit even larger. \nWith the three losses this weekend, the Hoosiers will remain in last place in the Big Ten with hopes of only playing the spoiler to intra-state rival Purdue next weekend.\nThe season-ending series with the Boilermakers also will determine the outcome of the Titan Series. "We are out for blood," Vitielliss said. "We got to end the season on a good note for the seniors and just to beat our hated rivals." \n-- Contact staff writer Benjames Derrick at bderrick@indiana.edu.