Baseball takes Big Ten opening series

Junior catcher Kyle Schwarber leaned against the gray fence just outside Bart Kaufman field after doing interviews with reporters.

The IU baseball team had just lost the final game of the three game series against Michigan on Sunday, but Schwarber was out signing autographs for young Hoosier fans.

Despite taking two of three in its conference opening series, the IU team was not happy with its performance.

“Words can’t really describe how mad and upset we are with ourselves,” Schwarber said. “That’s a game that we easily should’ve had. We made mental mistakes and physical mistakes, and it was just all around not a very well-played game by us and we need to figure out what this team is going to be about.”

IU (12-9, 2-1) had its chances, stranding runners in scoring position with no outs in the eighth inning, and left the bases loaded with one out in the fourth inning. IU left a total of 32 base runners on base in the series.

Junior Chris Suika was on third with no outs in the eighth when he was picked off, following a failed bunt attempt that IU Coach Tracy Smith said was not supposed to be a suicide squeeze.

IU then had runners at first and third with two outs. Junior outfielder Will Nolden hit a deep fly ball to the right field corner that was caught by a diving Jackson Lamb, a 6-foot-6-inch freshman for Michigan (9-14-1, 1-2).

“The kid made a great catch in right field,” Smith said. “That ball flies, and maybe we’re sitting here with a different mood.”

The Hoosiers won game one 5-3 on Friday, and took game two 5-1 on Saturday before the 4-3 loss on Sunday.

“If we win every Big Ten series I think we will be feeling pretty good about ourselves,” Smith said. “But I’m a little stung with the way we played here, and it’ll probably be a good three weeks before I forget about it.”

Senior pitcher Joey DeNato picked up his fourth win of the year for the Hoosiers in game one, going five and one third innings with five strikeouts. He also walked five batters and gave up three earned runs on four hits. He currently has a 2.39 ERA.

Junior pitcher Kyle Hart pitched game two for IU and went seven innings, giving up no runs on two hits and seven strikeouts. He is now 3-1 on the season with a 2.01 ERA.

Sophomore pitcher Christian Morris started game three and went five innings, giving up four runs, only one earned, on eight hits, and a career-high five strikeouts. He took the loss for IU and goes to 0-2 with a 2.43 ERA.

“We can’t ask more from what our pitchers are doing right now,” Smith said. “They are giving us a chance to win every single baseball game. My frustration is with us offensively. We are too good of hitters to be doing what we are offensively, and we need to pull together.”

Smith said the team was playing with a lack of focus, and too many players were trying to do too much in their at-bats.

“At the end of the day, if I have to lose a battle to win the war with this group I’m okay with that,” Smith said. “My message to them was we’re an average baseball team (when we are giving at-bats away). If we want to be special and a championship caliber team, then we need to make some adjustments.”