On March 19, the IU baseball team had just beaten Purdue and secured its eighth consecutive win, putting the Hoosiers at 8-1 on the season. Now only a few weeks later, IU is 11-7 and has lost five straight games.
IU was swept by Ohio State this weekend in Columbus, Ohio, and only scored seven runs across the four-game series. IU’s fielding struggled at times, too, as the Hoosiers committed eight errors on the weekend.
The rough series for IU began and concluded with two one-run games. On Friday, IU trailed 2-0 early and came up short on a comeback attempt, losing 3-2. In Sunday’s series finale, Ohio State junior infielder Zach Dezenzo capped off a big day at the plate with a walk-off RBI single, his fourth hit of the ballgame.
The two games on Saturday were not nearly as close. The Hoosiers were blanked 6-0 in the first game and lost 5-2 in the second game.
Related: [IU baseball wins 2 of 3 games against Purdue this weekend]
Ultimately, IU could not gain any momentum at the plate this weekend. The Hoosiers only scored more than one run in an inning once, scoring two in the eighth inning of the last game. However, IU did piece together six and seven hits in the final two games this weekend, an improvement from the five total it tallied in its first two games.
A week ago, the Hoosiers were alone atop the conference at 11-3. Now at 11-7, IU finds itself in fourth place, a half game behind Ohio State and a half game in front of Northwestern. Michigan and Nebraska are tied atop the standings at 13-5.
Next weekend, the Hoosiers will be back home at Bart Kaufman Field for the first time since March 21 for a three-game series with Illinois. The Fighting Illini are 8-10 this season and are coming off a 1-2 weekend against Nebraska. Next weekend will be the only three meetings between the two teams this season.
