IU riding win streak into Xavier game

As the IU baseball team travels to play Xavier today at 3 p.m. at Hayden Field in Cincinnati, it’s riding its longest win streak of the year at six games.\nAnd the hot streak could not come at a better time, with the start of Big Ten season just two days away.\nEven with the conference opener against Michigan State so close, the Hoosiers (10-8) aren’t looking past the Musketeers.\n“Every game you want to go out and do your best, no matter who you’re playing,” freshman outfielder Sterling Mack said. “We’re going to take this game, see what we can do and try to get better.”\nIn Xavier the Hoosiers will be facing a team coming off its first series sweep in five years. The Musketeers swept Dayton this past weekend at home, lifting their season record to 7-18.\nIU is riding high, too, after a two-game sweep of IPFW that extended its current win streak dating back to a March 14 game at North Florida. The Hoosiers think this past weekend’s wins will give them a boost at Xavier.\n“I think it helps getting a couple wins,” freshman pitcher Matt Bashore said. “We should be able to roll in confident.”\nBashore got the win in Sunday’s victory, throwing five shutout innings of three-hit ball. The freshman starter is now 3-1 this season with a 1.63 ERA in five appearances, four of them starts.\nThe spark for the Hoosiers during their streak has been a blend of pitching, defense and speed, a combination that works for IU coach Tracy Smith. With his team’s success with the small-ball mentality, Smith does not want to see his team start swinging for the fences.\n“We’re going to have to rely on our pitching and defense,” Smith said. “I just don’t want the guys to press and think they have to hit a bunch of home runs. Then we’ll start pulling off the ball. A ‘W’ is a ‘W,’ and we have to adapt to our personnel. We’re not a power team.”\nThe Hoosiers have adapted, taking advantage of their team speed to put runs on the board.\nThrough 18 games, IU has stolen 44 bases in 53 attempts while their opponents have managed just 14 in 22 tries. Sophomore center fielder Andrew Means leads the team with 12 steals and freshman second baseman Evan Crawford is close behind with 10 of his own.\nBalancing out the base stealing, the pitching staff has held opponents to three runs or less in four of the six games in the current win streak.\n“It’s great for the pitchers to go out and throw some great games,” Means said. “We’ve had games where they go out and throw two-hit games, and we just haven’t hit the ball. Now, we’re starting to hit the ball so it’s starting to all come together.”\nFor today’s game with Xavier, Smith said he will continue to tinker with his lineup in the last warmup before Big Ten season begins. He will try to find some added power to match the speed while also getting some players some at-bats.\nSmith and his coaches will take a similar approach with the pitching staff, trying to let his players get in one more tune-up.\n“You want to stay healthy,” Smith said, “probably rest the pitching staff a bit, use some guys trying to carry on into the weekend. Just try to continue to play good baseball. We look at it as prep for the weekend.”