The NKU Baseball team has found the last two series against Horizon League foes a struggle to say the least. Last weekend NKU dropped two of three at Oakland, managing to salvage a win on get away day, then returned home to play a non-conference matchup against Ohio before welcoming in Milwaukee for another weekend matchup.
Milwaukee, for their part, arrived in Highland Heights coming off a 2-2 week which saw them drop two of three to conference leader Wright State before grabbing a non-conference win against Division III UW-River Falls. The Panthers, like the Golden Grizzlies, took two from the Norse before NKU came back to avoid the sweep.
Friday’s opening game saw Milwaukee jump all over the Norse scoring three runs in the second inning, then adding another four runs in the third and six more in the fourth to race to a 13-0 lead and forcing a run-rule and handing NKU a 13-3 loss.
Conner Linn (0-1) took the loss for the Norse only going 2 2/3 of an inning, giving up seven runs on six hits. The Norse bats were silent for the most part, managing only five hits on the day.
NKU looked to rebound in Saturday’s second game as they sent Junior Logan Wilson to the mound in hopes of evening up the series. Wilson went 2 2/3 of an inning allowing two runs while striking out three Panther batters.
The Norse opened strong out of the gates jumping out to a quick 4-0 lead in the bottom of the first courtesy of a Grand Slam by Tyler Shaneyfelt. A Nolan Sparks homer in the bottom of the second extended the Norse lead to 5-0 and to what many felt would be an NKU win.
Milwaukee had other ideas as they managed to claw back and take the lead in the top half of the sixth inning 6-5.
NKU took the lead back at 8-6 in the bottom of the eighth inning only to see Milwaukee plate five runs in the top half of the ninth to take an 11-8 lead and hold for the win securing the series.
Aaron Massie took the loss for the Norse, giving up five runs on five hits.
NKU looked to avoid the series sweep on Sunday as they sent Senior Aaron Boster (4-2) to the mound. The Norse did their damage early on jumping out to a 2-0 lead by the second inning, a result of another Sparks homerun and a Logen Devenport RBI. Devenport went 3-for-4 from the plate on the day and swiped a pair of bases. Sparks was 2-for-5 with a homer.
Boster for his part pitched six no-hit innings while striking out six on the day to pick up his fifth win of the season.
From Dizzy’s Desk
“It was a tough weekend. We were able to salvage the last game on a good performance by Aaron Bolster. He really stepped up for his teammates.”
“Have to give Milwaukee credit, they came in here and had a good weekend and beat us.”
Next Up:
With the win, NKU improved to 15-11 overall and 5-4 in the Horizon League. The Norse hit the road for another non-conference matchup with former GVLVC rival Southern Indiana on Tuesday, April 1st at 6:00pm in Evansville before welcoming in conference leading Wright State the weekend of April 4-6 at Bill Aker Baseball Complex.
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