Indiana softball has come down to Earth after breaking the record for most consecutive wins, as its losing streak has reached four following a sweep at home at the hands of Nebraska.
The Hoosiers lost all three games to the Cornhuskers by scores of 12-2, 8-6, and 4-2. Despite getting outhit 35-14 in the three game set, Indiana kept both games on Saturday close but were unable to come up with a big hit to push them over the edge.
“We gotta do a better job of executing our game plan at the plate and I don’t think this weekend we did that,” head coach Shonda Stanton said after the series.
The series finale Saturday was a telling tale of how the series went for Indiana after getting run-ruled in Friday’s contest. Team 50 left 10 runners left on base, including the tying runs in the bottom of the seventh inning. Junior outfielder Aaliyah Andrews flew out with two runners in scoring position to end the game, and the series.
“Not much more you can ask for with the exception of a timely hit,” Stanton said. “And we just didn’t get it. And so we don’t need to overthink it.”
For reference, Indiana left a combined seven runners on base in the first two games of the series. Team 50 also had the tying run come to the plate in the first game on Saturday, but freshman infielder Taryn Kern and sophomore outfielder Taylor Minnick couldn’t come through in the clutch.
Hitting in crunch time wasn’t the only reason why Indiana lost. The defense, which was a concern during the midweek loss against the University of Notre Dame, also led to Indiana getting swept for the first time this season against a single opponent in a series.
Indiana committed five errors, with three of them coming in the series finale. The second leg of the doubleheader on Saturday was not clean by any means, as both teams made three errors in the field and combined to leave 17 runners on base.
Stanton said Indiana’s offense couldn’t outhit its defense, meaning they couldn’t make up for the extra outs they gave Nebraska when they were up to the plate. Stanton knew that the Cornhuskers had really good offense, which is conveyed by the 35 hits they had against the Hoosiers.
The three losses this weekend combined with the loss to the Fighting Irish means Indiana’s losing streak is at four, the second largest skid of the season, just one game behind the five game losing skid Team 50 had after losing all five games in the ESPN Clearwater Invitational back in February.
Stanton is not worried about the morale of the team after losing six of its last seven contests.
“When you map out the course of a season, I don’t care where you put the wins and losses, right now we’re still sitting pretty good,” Stanton said. Indiana still has over twice as many wins as losses at 31-15 overall, but now 9-5 in the conference after starting 9-0.
Indiana will get a much-needed break, as Team 50 won’t play a midweek contest for the first time in nearly a month.
“Some rest will be good for this group,” Stanton said.
She mentioned that Nebraska had the week off, whereas Indiana came back from a weekend series at Minnesota to play the University of Louisville at home and hop on a bus the next day to play Notre Dame.
With no game Sunday, Indiana will have five full days to regroup before hitting the road to play Rutgers in a three-game series starting Friday.
