Nebraska Baseball Looking To End Regular Season On High Note

The Nebraska Baseball team will finish the regular season at home against the Indiana Hoosiers and a series sweep would likely put the Huskers in second place in the Big Ten.

While some might not think there’s going to be that big a difference between the second seed and the third seed in the Big Ten Tournament, those two spots do seem to portend a different caliber of opponent. If the standings stay the way they are right now, the Huskers will take on a Michigan State team that is 33-16 on the year. If the Nebraska baseball team were able to vault into the second seed, they would take on a Maryland squad that is 26-24 on the season. They would also get to play their first game of the tourney at the much more sensible 1 PM, as opposed to 9 AM next Wednesday.

There’s no guarantee the Terps would actually be easier to beat in the first round than the Spartans, but there isn’t a team in the tournament that doesn’t want a higher seed than what they already have. In order for the Huskers to get that higher seed, they’ll need to play perfect baseball.

We should know fairly early on in the series, which starts tonight at 6:35 PM whether or not the Huskers have brought their “A” game to Haymarket park. Indiana seems to want to make sure they clinch their #2 seed as soon as possible, as they are throwing their best pitcher in Kyle Hart tonight.

Hart has posted a 10-2 record with an earned run average of 2.99 on the season. Even better than those numbers is the fact he’s struck out 70 and walked just 15 in 87 innings. In order to counter Hart, the Nebraska baseball team will go with Derek Burkamper. Burkamper has bounced from the rotation to the bullpen but has managed to post a 5-2 record with a 3.12 ERA.

Over 57 innings, Burkamper has a nice strikeout rate as well (50 Ks) but he’s walking a lot more people than the Huskers would like to see (30). The good news is, Nebraska likely has the advantage in the next two baseball games in the series as far as the pitching matchup goes. Friday night’s contest will feature Matt Waldron (6-2, 2.98) vs Caleb Baragar (4-3, 2.38) and then Saturday’s matchup at 1:02 PM will have Jake Meyers (5-1, 1.63) vs Evan Bell (2-3, 3.26).

When it comes to offense, Nebraska seems to have the edge, especially if they can carry over the momentum they had on Tuesday night against the Creighton Bluejays. The Nebraska baseball team hammered the Jays to the tune of 15-2 and first baseman Scott Schreiber led the way by going 5 for 6 at the plate with two homers and a double.

Schreiber is the Huskers’ secret weapon this year, posting a .316 average with 15 home runs and 52 RBI. That homer total has the Nebraska sophomore just four behind the nation’s best. That total is also almost twice as many homers as anyone on Indiana has managed and his RBI is 15 more than any Hoosier has gotten this season.

The really good news for Husker fans is that an offense that has largely struggled during the Darin Erstad era has been very, very good for most of this season. The team has four players who currently boast an average over .300 while the Hoosiers boast just two regulars who can say the same.

Next: Nebraska Baseball Crushes Creighton To Open Big Week

If you’re looking for who should be the favorite to win the series, keep in mind that Indiana has an RPI of just 93 while the Huskers have a much more respectable, if not sparkling RPI of 47. Buckle up for the last weekend of the college baseball regular season because the conference tournament kicks off next Wednesday.