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Jett Buck does it in the field and at the plate today | Nebraska Athletics
They showed up! Nebraska fans turned out in mass to cheer on their Cornhusker baseball team on a day that flipped back and forth from light rain to beautiful sunshine. Hosting a regional for the first time in 18 years, the seats were full in the stadium with an announced sell out and the berms were full. Along the rails around the field people were standing three-deep trying to get a glimpse of the action on the field.
Nebraska’s top starter Carson Jasa took the mound for Nebraska against the familiar opponent from north of the border. Jasa brought a 9-2 record to his matchup against SDSU starter Sam Schlecht (4-4). Both of them are tall right handers, but their collection of pitches could not be any different with Jasa the flamethrower and Schlecht being the master of the change up and off-speed stuff.
Nebraska threatened early but could not muster a run, leaving two runners on base in each of the first two innings, and another one in the third. They struggled with Schlecht’s change-up and were not able to put the barrel of the bat on the ball.
The Jacks put runners on the corners in the top of the third thanks to a walk and a hit, but a very slick double-play turned by Dylan Carey and Rhett Stokes bailed Jasa out of the inning with no damage done.
Jett Buck led off the bottom of the fourth ripping a liner off the glove of third baseman Nolan Grawe and ended up on second base as well as sparking the Cornhusker crowd. Joshua Overbeek followed with a single to left, putting runners on the corners. Up came Trey Fikes who hit a line-drive that tipped off the glove of a leaping second baseman Matthew Werk. Buck scored for the first run of the game.
The Big Red added one more off reliever Ty Madison as Stokes bunted the baserunners up 90-feet bringing up the top of the order. Mac Moyer put the ball in play on the right side allowing Overbeek to come home with the Cornhusker’s second run. After four innings, Nebraska was up 2-0.
In the top of the sixth inning, Jasa plunked lead-off man Carter Taylor in the ribs and Dayton Franke followed with a single down the rightfield line to move him to third. Wanting to take advantage of some momentum, the Jacks called on Keagan Jirschele to lay down a bunt to squeeze home a run. Maybe a good idea, but poor execution as he sent the ball right back to Jasa, who flipped it to Worthley for the easy tag at the plate. Run averted.
The Jackrabbits weren’t done trying to get that first run on the board. Werk laced a single to leftfield with runners on first and second. Franke was sent home and Jett Buck came up throwing. He threw a laser home to Fikes, who did a brilliant job grabbing the ball and putting the tag on the runner before he reached the plate. Second run averted.
SDSU would finally get a run in the inning when reliever J’Shawn Unger gave up his second single of the inning to Owen Siegert, who drove in Jirschele to make it 2-1 Nebraska. Unger walked the next batter to load the bases, raising the tension in the ballpark, but then gave the red-clad masses a chance to release it as he struck out Nate Wachter swinging.
Dylan Carey gave the crowd what they were waiting for in the bottom of the eighth. He blasted a towering home run on a 2-2 pitch from Madison that brought the crowd to their feet once again. It looked like Nebraska may be able to blow this one open as Madison walked Sanderson and Drew Grego came to the plate. However, Grego’s bunt attempt flew into the glove of Grawe at third, who then fired across the diamond to double-off Sanderson.
All was not lost on the inning though as Jett Buck showed that opposite field power we saw earlier in the season as he homered to the party porch in right-centerfield. Going to the ninth, Nebraska extended their lead to 4-2.
With Ty Horn tossing lightly in the bullpen, Unger came back out for his third inning of work and faced the bottom of the Jackrabbit order. Franke grounded out to Overbeek and then Unger stepped up to win it in style by striking Jirschele and Werk. Ball game! Nebraska 4, South Dakota State 1.
Carson Jasa sat down at least three of his strikeouts looking at a sneaky off-speed pitch on the inside black. Of his eight strikeouts, six were called third strikes. He went 6.1 innings, giving up five hits, walking two and hitting one with 92 pitches for the win. J’Shawn Unger got his 13th save recording four strikeouts in 2.2 innings.
The ballpark was full so it is a little surprise that official attendance was 7828. It appeared there would be more than that.
With rain in the forecast most of the day Saturday, it could be a mystery what time Nebraska will play. They are scheduled for a 7:06 first pitch.
Notes:
- Jett Buck’s throw-out at the plate brought the loudest roar in the stadium for quite some time. Plus, you rarely get to see that play in a game.
- As always, there are a few upsets in the first round of the regional tournament. One that matters to Nebraska is Milwaukee’s 13-7 win over 4th seeded Auburn. This took place in the regional that Nebraska’s is paired with. Yes, there is a lot of baseball to play! We can’t ignore St. Mary’s 3-2 win over top-seeded UCLA. That one has stolen the headlines.
- While the Nebraska – South Dakota State matchup was not a really attractive one, it is interesting that it was relegated to streaming rather than carried on one of the many ESPN networks when they assigned their top college baseball broadcast team to the regional. Karl Ravitch and Kyle Peterson are in the house for the weekend. The Mothership apparently wanted to save some travel expenses as Peterson could just drive down from Elkhorn.
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