Big Ten Baseball Blog: Indiana Wins Big Ten Tournament

Saturday, May 23, 2009

Indiana Wins Big Ten Tournament

After Minnesota took care of Ohio State earlier in the day, they had to face #3 Indiana, who won their first three games of the tournament, and needed just one more win to take home the Big Ten hardware.

Indiana came into the game with an earlier 9-1 victory over Minnesota under their belt, and the confidence gained from that game definitley shined through as the Hoosiers dominated the Gophers 13-2. Indiana starter Matt Igel picked up just his 2nd victory of the year and gave up just 2 runs on 4 hits in 5 complete innings of work. Gopher starter Austin Lubinsky recieved his first loss of the year after giving up 7 runs (4 earned) on 8 hits in 3.1 innings pitched. Offensively, the Hoosier's hitters exploded once again for 18 hits, led by RF Chris Hervey who finished 3-4 with a run and 3 RBI. Alex Dickerson and Jake Dunning each added 3 hits a piece for Indiana and 1B Jerrud Sabourin went yard and collected two hits. The Gophers were held to just 6 hits, 2 from freshmen SS A.J. Pettersen who finished 2-4 with an RBI. 2B Derek McCallum crushed his 16th HR of the season over the CF fence, but finished 1-3 on the night.

With the win, Indiana wins the Big Ten Tournament and earns an automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament beginning late next week. The Hoosiers played nearly perfect baseball in Columbus throughout this week, and it will be interesting to see if they carry the momentum of this big achievement to the next level and make some noise in the NCAA tourney.

Both Minnesota and Ohio State appear to be locks for the NCAA tournament because of their overall records and strengths of schedules, although you never know, I've seen stranger things happen. Illinois' 4th place finish in the tournament certainly did not help their case, now most would consider the Illini a "longshot" to make the tournament.

With Indiana earning the automatic bid, and Minnesota and Ohio State appearing to be locks, this season could mark the first time in quite a while (I will try and research the specific year) that 3 or more Big Ten teams earn spots in the NCAA tournament. The regional pairings will be announced on Monday evening, stay tuned as I will provide coverage of this event and fill everyone in.

Overall it was an exciting weekend in Columbus and a great display of what Big Ten Baseball is all about. Congratulations not only to the Indiana Hoosiers, but all of the Big Ten teams for an outstanding and entertaining season of Big Ten Baseball.

---To all of you who have followed my blog throughout the season, thank you! I encourage you all to continue to follow the blog as I will update it with regional pairings, and results from the Big Ten teams who do qualify for the tournament. During the off-season I will continue to update the blog with news on Big Ten players taken in the MLB draft, recruiting, 2010 season previews, etc. Thanks for your support!

1 comment:

UnknownMay 25, 2009 at 9:31 AM
It was a great tournament to watch. Hudington Park is a great venue for baseball. All of the teams competing had great defense and offense. I think 4 teams deserve bids this year to NCAA. It was a tight race in the big ten with the top 4 teams neck and neck in the standings. Nice blog! Keep it coming.
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Big Ten Baseball Blog

Hello everyone and thanks for checking out my Big Ten Baseball Blog! This website is a great resource for anyone and everyone who is interested in not only Big Ten baseball, but baseball in general. Obviously, the main topics of discussion will be Big Ten baseball, but there will also be discussion of other levels of baseball as well. I will try to faithfully update the blog with scores, statistics, standings, and discussions as much as possible.

If you are unfamiliar with Big Ten baseball, or the Big Ten conference in general, here is a quick overview:

The Big Ten Conference was established in 1895, and originally included seven midwestern universities (University of Chicago, University of Illinois, University of Michigan, University of Minnesota, Northwestern University, Purdue University, and the University of Wisconsin.). In 1899, Indiana University and Iowa University joined the Big Ten while in 1912, Ohio State joined. In 1946, Chicago withdrew from the Big Ten and later in 1949 Michigan State University was added. For a period of 40 years, the Big Ten remained with its 10 members until 1990 when the Big Ten agreed to add Pennsylvania State University. Since this addition, the Big Ten has become the 11-team elite athletics conference it is today. In recap, today's Big Ten conference includes Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Michigan St., Iowa, Penn St., Northwestern, Purdue, Indiana, Ohio St., and Wisconsin.

The Big Ten athletics conference competes in 12 men's sports and 13 women's sports, and has become one of the strongest collegiate athletics conferences in the nation. Among these is baseball, this blog's focus.

Big Ten baseball has a long and rich tradition which sadly has gone "under the radar" due to the lack of popularity of not only baseball in the midwest, but college baseball in general. It is my goal to gain more attention to this great conference and sport which is always filled with extremely gifted student athletes and exciting competition.

Currently, 10 of the 11 teams in the Big Ten conference compete in men's baseball. Wisconsin is the only team which does not participate, cutting their program in the late 1980's. These 10 teams play a full 50-60 game schedule each spring, and ultimately strive to become not only Big Ten champions, but NCAA champions. Each season, teams play a handful of non-conference games against various opponents across the nation, as well as 24 games against conference opponents (this determines who wins the Big Ten regular season championship). Once the 24 conference games have completed, the top 6 teams in the conference recieve spots in the Big Ten tournament, which has been held at the regular season champion's home field in the past, but this year will be held at a neutral site in Columbus, OH (Huntington Park). The winner of this tournament recieves an automatic bid into the NCAA baseball tournament which ultimately determines the national champion.

Each year, Big Ten teams are getting more talented and are creating a more exciting situtation for fans and followers. The Big Ten has produced some very quality major league baseball players, and will continue to do so.

I hope that this blog will serve as a great resource for you to follow, learn, and enjoy the great sport of baseball, and more specifically, in the great Big Ten Conference.