The Buckeyes got off to a strong start with 4.2 innings from Jake Michalak and a 3-2 lead through five innings. (Press Pros Feature Photos)
A strong start by Jake Michalak, a first inning home run by Lee Ellis, and an early 3-0 lead proved not to be enough. The Buckeyes drop the series finale and 14 games under .500 with a 6-4 Sunday loss to Minnesota.
Columbus, OH – Some things, so it seems, aren’t meant to be.
Needing a win over Minnesota to avoid a second conference sweep in two weeks, the Ohio State Buckeyes rode a first inning home run by shortstop Lee Ellis Sunday to an early 3-0 lead.
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More, starting pitcher Jake Michalak came out strongly, throwing blanks for the first three innings before leaving two outs deep in the fifth having a 3-2 lead, and 4.2 innings of 2-run, 3-hit baseball.
Publisher Sonny Fulks writes OHSAA sports and the Buckeyes for Press Pros Magazine.
On a cloudless, 60-degree day, it seem the perfect backdrop for the Buckeyes to break a losing streak, and power through to their ninth win of the season, and a mood-lifter!
That all came undone as Minnesota (16-17) rallied against three Buckeye relievers over the final 4.1 innings to score 4 runs on 6 hits, take advantage of some loose defense in the top of the ninth to win 6-4…claim the sweep…and board the plane back to the Twin Cities with some added juice for the final four weeks of the conference schedule.
It left the Buckeyes (8-24, 2-13 in Big Ten play) dazed over the reality of something that no one could have imagined back in mid-February – with impact players at four positions and enough pitching anchored by returning lettermen to compete for one of the twelve tournament seeds in mid-May. Who could have seen this coming?
“No, no I don’t think so,” said a quiet, but resolute Justin Haire in his post-game remarks. “And our guys wouldn’t have, either. They show up everyday with good attitudes, work hard, and I hate it for them more than anything else because they’re putting in the time and the work.
Minnesota’s Drew Berkland tries but can’t reach Lee Ellis’ two-run home run in the bottom of the first.
“Right now we’re not playing well enough to break through, and when you’re on a skid you have to make your own breaks and we’re not making that happen. Nobody just hands you a win. We thought today was going to be our day because I’ll take 4.2 innings from Michalak and a lead every time. But we weren’t able to finish it off.”
After pitching three scoreless, Michalak ran into trouble in the fourth on a hit and three walks, including back-to-back walks that forced in a run, but yet he walked to the dugout after the third out with a 3-2 lead.
Leading 3-2 he again found trouble in the fifth after two outs with a walk and a base hit, giving up the ball to reliever Doug Bauer who quickly closed out the inning with a strikeout to keep the lead intact.
Turn about, Ohio State scored a single fun in the fifth when Minnesota pitchers loaded the bases with a hit batsman and three walks, forcing in a run…Buckeyes, 4-2.
But Bauer, who’s pitched so well in recent outings, ran into trouble of his own in the sixth as the Gophers touched him for a pair of walks and a pair of doubles to tie the score at 4-4, with lefthander Luke Carrell coming in to record the final out.
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The Buckeyes’ offense, so robust early, suddenly fell silent after the fifth inning as Minnesota’s bullpen, principally righthander Joe Sperry, simply shut down the bats with 4.1 innings of no-run, no-hit baseball, striking out three. In all, the Buckeyes would not have a hit over the final five innings, their last being a single by Tyler Pettorini in the fourth.
And that proved costly, because the Buckeyes left seven men on base in third, fourth and fifth innings, that for want of a two-out hit would have been the difference in the ballgame.
No end to the pain…Lee Ellis takes a fastball in the ribs during Sunday’s 6-4 loss to Minnesota at Bill Davis Stadium.
After a scoreless seventh, Carrell pitched well into the eighth when with two outs he gave up a solo home run to Minnesota’s Weber Neels, 5-4, and the Gophers’ first lead of the game. And if that was a turning point, an insurance run by Minnesota in the top of the ninth proved to be the nail in the coffin.
Carrell hit the first two Gopher hitters to begin the ninth. Designated hitter Charlie Sutherland then lifted a fly ball to right, with the lead runner moving to third base. Minnesota had runners on the corners with one out when catcher Sam Hunt, who had one previously base hit for the season, surprised the Buckeyes with a delayed squeeze bunt that scored the lead runner from the third to make the Gopher lead 6-4.
“Honestly I thought they would run some first-to-third offense in that situation like they had done on Saturday,” said Haire. “Hunt had limited at bats and experience, and he just kinda’ nubbed one off the end. It wasn’t a great bunt, and it wasn’t firm enough to make a play on the runner at the plate. Again, I thought they might have done some hit and run there, and they went safety squeeze and pushed a run across.”
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Trailing 6-4, the Buckeyes sent Ellis, Pettorini and Graveline to the plate in the home ninth, all three went silently on a fly ball and a pair of groundouts, and the Buckeyes had lost their eighth in a row, and 24th of the season.
Wright State, always a tough non-con challenge out of the Horizon League, comes to Bill Davis on Tuesday for what one would hope to be some confidence-building before they go on the road next weekend in East Lansing and Michigan State. And make no mistake, this one stung as players were held back from media questioning after the game, and Haire did his best to paint the current glass half-full.
Justin Haire had his differences with plate umpire Jay Meyer over an interference call in Sunday’s loss to Minnesota.
“All you can do is to put your best foot forward,” he concluded before leaving the post-game presser. “You have to try to enjoy putting the uniform on everyday, being with your teammates everyday, and playing baseball everyday. At some point those days end and you don’t always know when that last day will come. We need to value that every single day and try to maximize it the best that we can.”
Minnesota’s first-year coach Ty McDevitt knows something about what Haire and the Buckeyes are going through, coming off records of 6-31 in 2021, 16-36 in 2022, and 18-34 in 2023 before rebounding to 25-23 a year ago.
“Sometimes you have to shake things up,” he said Sunday, referencing that one bunt play that pushed across the important insurance run in the ninth inning. “Sometimes you find a way to make players do the things that are out of their comfort zone.”
And no better time than right now.
Because…comfort, and wins, have been hard to find at Bill Davis.
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