Starter Chase Herrell threw five scoreless innings Saturday to gain the win over Valparaiso, his first of the 2025 season. (Press Pros Feature Photos)
They got just enough pitching, 13 hits overall, and the first-ever home run by Will Carpenter to beat Valpo, 15-4, and even the home-opening series.
Columbus, OH – Technically, it was an ugly win.
But when you’re 2-9 any win’s a thing of beauty, even if it has a few warts.
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Such was Saturday’s 15-4 Ohio State win over Valparaiso, a cold, windy affair that saw the Buckeyes outhit Valpo 13-5, and use a 6-run seventh inning to come away with their 3rd win of the season.
Publisher Sonny Fulks writes OHSAA sports and the Buckeyes for Press Pros Magazine.
Important, too, starter Chase Herrell pitched the first five innings to gain his first win of the season, surrendering no runs on 3 hits, striking out one…and walking 6!
The walks, and the ‘wild side’ have been a plague to this team and pitching staff through twelve games, but Herrell proved masterful in pitching around them on an inclimate day that made it tough to feel the baseball, much less throw it. Offensively, they actually benefited from it.
The Buckeyes scored 1 in the first, 2 in the second, and 2 again in the third, highlighted by an arching home run to right field by first baseman Will Carpenter, his first as a Buckeye, and his first as a collegian during stops at Penn State, John Logan Juco, and Ohio State. They added a single run in the fourth to go up a by a comfortable 6-0 margin.
“It gives me one more [home run] than my big brother (Matt),” he laughed. The older Carpenter was an infielder for the Buckeyes from 2017-’20 (now an assistant at Liberty University).
Hats off to Carpenter…Will Carpenter cracked his first collegiate home run in the Buckeyes’ 3-run fourth inning.
“It was a special moment for me, obviously, but the most important thing was it helped the team out. That’s why I liked to put a good swing on it today.”
Herrell was sturdy through the first five before turning the ball over to reliever Drew Erdmann in the sixth.
“I had the walks, you can’t change that,” Herrell said. “But I pretty much put it behind me and tried to focus on the next pitch. Thinking about past walks and past innings can’t help anything so I try to stay in the present.”
And with four dependable starts behind him now, the Cincinnati sophomore is showing that he’s in the midst of taking the next step as a college weekend starter.
“I’m executing better, I’ve learned from last year that I don’t have to be too fine. I try to execute my spot without trying to make a super-good pitch. Just make a good pitch, one pitch at a time.”
Erdmann pitched a non-eventful sixth, but could not duplicate that in the seventh.
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He walked the first two hitters of the inning, then gave up a three-run blast to right to cut the margin to 6-3. Erdmann then encored with another homer to left from the ensuing hitter, and suddenly the Bucukeyes were in familiar territory of losing a commanding lead from out of the bullpen.
But with a 15 mph wind blowing out to right field, this was a day for offense and the Buckeyes came to the plate in the bottom of the seventh to score six times off Valparaiso’s bullpen with a double by Mason Eckelman, a pair of walks, a hit batsman, a triple by Lee Ellis, and a double by Tyler Pettorini.
Trey Lipsey scored the first of 15 runs in the bottom of the first (above).
They added three more in the bottom of the eighth on a double by Matt Graveline, and singles by Nick Giamarusti and Trey Lipsey…run-ruling Valpo, 15-4 in eight innings.
The Buckeyes won with 15 runs on 13 hits and played error-free baseball.
Valparaiso had 4 runs on 5 hits, committed one error and left 12 men on base.
And how did those 12 men get on base?
Buckeyes pitchers, as is their custom through twelve games, walked ten, following Friday’s nine-walk mess, raising their season’s total through 102 innings pitched to 81. Comparing, they’ve struck 82, an almost 1 to 1 ratio of strikeouts to walks.
Valparaiso had their own issues Saturday, walking 9 in 7-plus innings, and most of those free bases came back to haunt, especially in the Buckeyes’ 6-run seventh.
Any baseball game is an ugly affair when you have 19 walks in eight innings of baseball, which Ohio State and Valparaiso achieved Saturday, and prompts these two questions to any coach at any level. Why is your hair falling out? And why is it suddenly so hard to throw strikes?
“Why is it harder?” Justin Haire began. “I think there are a number of factors. One, before everyone was throwing a hundred miles per hour, back in the day of the baseball purist…the strike zones were wider than now. Maybe the stuff wasn’t as electric then as now, but there were some who had it. And now guys get paid in the big leagues for stuff (velocity), and not so much pitchibility. I think the training aspect drives it, I think the strike zone being smaller drives it because with the smaller zone you have to have better stuff in the zone to get guys out. So it’s not all positive, and it’s not all negative. It’s somewhere in the middle. If you have guys with good stuff who throw a bunch of strikes you’ve got a chance to be really good, and we’re hoping to keep pushing to get to that level.”
But in the meantime this baseball team is going to have to score a lot of runs to win games, thus far a remarkable average of 14.3 runs per game through twelve.
And to give credibility to the argument that bases-on-balls are contagious, the Buckeyes are hitting just .264 as a team, but have received 56 walks by opposing pitchers – 56 free base runners.
Freshman Maddix Simpson made this fine running play to retire the third out and stop a rally in the third inning.
“We’re just getting traffic on base and getting those guys in scoring position,” he said, post-game, Saturday. “Find a way to score, and that was important for us today to come out hot the way we did. Our guys responded, we kept constant pressure on them, and I was proud of them.”
Herrell being the one constant thus far as a weekend starter, Haire is appreciative, but the search continues for reliability as the Big Ten schedule opens next weekend.
“Today was a grinder outing for Chase,” he added. “He wasn’t feeling his best, and that’s going to happen because they say that you’re going to feel your absolute best only about a third of the time. Today was at the lower third of his best, but we challenge our guys to act differently than how they feel sometimes, and he was able to do that today. Got his first win of the year and I’m happy for him because he’s given us four really good outings.”
Somehow they need to rinse and repeat tomorrow as the series concludes with an important game and a chance to start a new week with a series win. It isn’t much, perhaps, but 4-9 makes you feel like you’re better than 3-10. You look for any advantage you can find.
Other notes:
Lee Ellis had another good day at the plate Saturday. He went 3 for 5 with a triple and drove in three runs.
Trey Lipsey was 2 for 5 with three RBIs and 3 runs scored.
Tyler Pettorini was 2 for 5 and has raised his batting average back above .300, at .314.
Reliever Luke Carrell helped out his ‘earnie’ with two innings of scoreless, hitless baseball. Carrell struck out 4 of the 6 batters he retired.
First pitch Sunday is scheduled for 1 pm, eastern DAYLIGHT time.
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