All Things Gopher Baseball

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Another home loss, as Maryland hits 3 home runs and cruises to a 8-2 win. 3 errors officially, and could have been charged with more. Hard to believe we still have just 1 conference win at home.
 

A day after the Gophers couldn't take advantage of 5 Terrapin errors in an 8-5 loss, today they never lead in an 11-10 loss in the home finale. The bats finally showed some life to rally after being down 9-1, but 10 walks combined with a couple missed opportunities to get outs at home plate spells another L.

Looks like we will finish in 16th place. 1-14 at home in conference play. Even in the dumpster fire season of 2021, we were 4-14 at home. Guessing this is worst home conference record in program history. The hitting has been disappointing. Coming into today, we were last in runs scored in Big 10 play. The second half of season has gone south.
 

SomeGopherFan said:
A day after the Gophers couldn't take advantage of 5 Terrapin errors in an 8-5 loss, today they never lead in an 11-10 loss in the home finale. The bats finally showed some life to rally after being down 9-1, but 10 walks combined with a couple missed opportunities to get outs at home plate spells another L.

Looks like we will finish in 16th place. 1-14 at home in conference play. Even in the dumpster fire season of 2021, we were 4-14 at home. Guessing this is worst home conference record in program history. The hitting has been disappointing. Coming into today, we were last in runs scored in Big 10 play. The second half of season has gone south.
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We just didn't have the quality depth to withstand the number of injuries we got hit with this year. Offensively I don't think we had a single game where all 9 of our preseason starters were available. Starts from game 1 with Perry being out the first few weeks, then Fitzgerald is out a while, then the big loss of Spanier, Hokenson misses some time, Knoll the last month and a half and Elbeery too. There were a number of guys really playing through some stuff too especially in weeks 3-7 or so.
On the mound I was really hoping we would add another starter last summer but we weren't able to and then we get hit with Semb deciding to be done with baseball over winter break and we actually held up pretty well for the most part until the Selvig injury and that really unravled things.
 

It's really unfortunate at how the season swung once the final weekend of March rolled around. It takes away from the fact that much of February and March had some quality outcomes against really tough competition. Going into that Iowa series the Gophers were viewed as having a legitimate chance at the NCAA tournament. My how things have changed.
 

DarrenTheGreek said:
It's really unfortunate at how the season swung once the final weekend of March rolled around. It takes away from the fact that much of February and March had some quality outcomes against really tough competition. Going into that Iowa series the Gophers were viewed as having a legitimate chance at the NCAA tournament. My how things have changed.
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I agree, a lot of optimism when the B1G season started. All those home loses including the sweep by what ended up being a bad Purdue right off the bat.
 


I didn't have the Gophers beating Dzierwa and the Spartans tonight, but they did exactly that, in a 4-3 win. Sutherland with an RBI double and Neels with a 2 run single in first, and then Martin with a long solo home run in 2nd, and the pitching was able to make it hold up. Sundquist was outstanding in relief, and Clausen with the save in a clean 9th. Combined 0 walks and 13 Ks for Gopher pitchers.
 

SomeGopherFan said:
I didn't have the Gophers beating Dzierwa and the Spartans tonight, but they did exactly that, in a 4-3 win. Sutherland with an RBI double and Neels with a 2 run single in first, and then Martin with a long solo home run in 2nd, and the pitching was able to make it hold up. Sundquist was outstanding in relief, and Clausen with the save in a clean 9th. Combined 0 walks and 13 Ks for Gopher pitchers.
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They really made him work early and had some great ABs against a top 5 round pick and top 2 pitcher in the conference. The Sutherland double might've been the hardest ball hit I've seen in baseball this year man that was loud. Martin has shown that glimpses of huge power and the next step will be more consistent ABs which you'd expect to grow with more experience. Man Sundquist was good tonight and really left it all out there extending himself, Clausen was efficient and breaker looked sharp tonight.
 

Offense was clicking tonight. 15 hits, couple long homeruns from Richter, one from Sutherland, and Martin. Really wish we could have seen what this team would have done if they stayed healthy.
 

Gophers bust out the long ball and cruise to a 11-5 win. Richter with a big 3 run HR to break it open, then later a 2 run HR. Sutherland with a long 2 run dinger right of center and Martin also with a solo shot. Remington with a solid 5.1 and Rooney finished it off working last 3.2. Good to see them still competing and potentially playing role of spoiler.
 



Goldy Gopher said:
Offense was clicking tonight. 15 hits, couple long homeruns from Richter, one from Sutherland, and Martin. Really wish we could have seen what this team would have done if they stayed healthy.
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This was as many injuries in a season as I can remember in a long time.
 

All too familiar loss this year wraps up the season as Michigan State gets two in the 9th to win 11-10. Offense battled back from an early hole with finally getting over the top on a Neels homer in the 9th. Neels, Richter, and Berkland all had homers earlier in the game as well. Argento started which probably doesn't happen if the game actually has implications for the Gophers and he got 1 out giving up 4 runs. Hemmesch was really good today before turning it over to Clausen who couldn't find his breaking ball today and a walk and hit batter load the bases with a single tying it. After a strikeout another single ended it for the Spartans.
 

It would have been a crushing loss had we been in the Spartan's position. Hemmesch was very efficient and was a bright spot in what was otherwise a long day on mound. Not sure why Sutherland didn't pitch that one ground ball to Whelan at first. Hitting was good, but considering we scored 3 runs on a misplayed popup to shortstop and they butchered two bunts, we were probably fortunate to be in position to win in the bottom of 9th to begin with


24-28 overall, 10-20 in Big 10. It was an odd year. Some good things: 6-6 in the non-conference weekends against pretty good competition, 2 top-10 wins (at least at the time), 9-6 on road in Big Ten, our best RPI since 2019. Also some bad: 1-14 at home in Big 10, the debacle against Kansas, injuries that piled up, and a 16th place finish overall and again no conference tourney.

I did think McDevitt installed a mentality of wanting the team to be more athletic, aggressive, grind out every at bat, etc. Still need to improve across the board, but optimistic it can be done.
 

In the conference, Oregon and UCLA both win big on the final day and share the regular season title. USC wins in 10 innings over Washington to finish 4th and gets the important 4th seed in tourney. The west coast schools finish 1st, 2nd , 4th and 5th. UCLA and Oregon are in NCAA; USC is in good shape as well but if they go 0-2 and the bubble is hard, it could get dicey for them. Also not a stretch to imagine Washington winning the conference tourney and all four west coast schools being the NCAA entries for the Big 10. Also, with UCLA and Oregon likely regional hosts, it is likely the conference drought without a regional winner might come to an end (🤣).

Meanwhile, in legacy Big Ten baseball land, Iowa won just one of their final 10 games and not only saw their title hopes slip away, but their at-large hopes are now toast as well. Michigan dropped four of their final six and is probably done as well for at-large.

While not surprised by the success of the west coast teams, this might be a big wake up call to the rest of the league to step up their game.
 



SomeGopherFan said:
It would have been a crushing loss had we been in the Spartan's position. Hemmesch was very efficient and was a bright spot in what was otherwise a long day on mound. Not sure why Sutherland didn't pitch that one ground ball to Whelan at first. Hitting was good, but considering we scored 3 runs on a misplayed popup to shortstop and they butchered two bunts, we were probably fortunate to be in position to win in the bottom of 9th to begin with


24-28 overall, 10-20 in Big 10. It was an odd year. Some good things: 6-6 in the non-conference weekends against pretty good competition, 2 top-10 wins (at least at the time), 9-6 on road in Big Ten, our best RPI since 2019. Also some bad: 1-14 at home in Big 10, the debacle against Kansas, injuries that piled up, and a 16th place finish overall and again no conference tourney.

I did think McDevitt installed a mentality of wanting the team to be more athletic, aggressive, grind out every at bat, etc. Still need to improve across the board, but optimistic it can be done.
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Only thing I can think on the Sutherland play is he was so shocked the ball got stuck in between that he didn't think quick enough to just toss his glove.
 

Goldy Gopher said:
Only thing I can think on the Sutherland play is he was so shocked the ball got stuck in between that he didn't think quick enough to just toss his glove.
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Actually, that's my mistake. I initially didn't see the ball got stuck. After I saw Sutherland motioning to his glove as such, so I thought that might have happened. However, by the time I posted later I forgot about that...🤦‍♂️
 

Was reading today that the pool tie-breakers in the Big Ten Tournament (should every team go 1-1) is the higher seed. How dumb. Basically if you are not the highest seed in your pool and you lose 1 game, you are screwed. They should have done "Runs Allowed" or "Run Differential".
 

DarrenTheGreek said:
Was reading today that the pool tie-breakers in the Big Ten Tournament (should every team go 1-1) is the higher seed. How dumb. Basically if you are not the highest seed in your pool and you lose 1 game, you are screwed. They should have done "Runs Allowed" or "Run Differential".
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Case in point. Illinois beat Michigan 6-5 today.
Tomorrow Illinois plays UCLA. If UCLA wins, they will clinch the pool with a 1-0 record (Illinois would be 1-1 and Michigan 0-1), making their game against Michigan on Wednesday absolutely meaningless. How could the conference be so stupid to have this go forward as the tie-breaker? You really want a game in the tournament to be meaningless?
 

DarrenTheGreek said:
Case in point. Illinois beat Michigan 6-5 today.
Tomorrow Illinois plays UCLA. If UCLA wins, they will clinch the pool with a 1-0 record (Illinois would be 1-1 and Michigan 0-1), making their game against Michigan on Wednesday absolutely meaningless. How could the conference be so stupid to have this go forward as the tie-breaker? You really want a game in the tournament to be meaningless?
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The ACC tournament had this same format for 8 years, although they dumped it this year in favor of a single-elimination, double-bye format. It just seems like another example to me of the Big 10 being late to the party baseball-wise. I did read an article stating they were open to changing the format next year, so it may not be around long.
 

SomeGopherFan said:
The ACC tournament had this same format for 8 years, although they dumped it this year in favor of a single-elimination, double-bye format. It just seems like another example to me of the Big 10 being late to the party baseball-wise. I did read an article stating they were open to changing the format next year, so it may not be around long.
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It's baffling how it got approved because if one simply thought about it for more than 30 seconds they would have realized the issues it would cause.

The current format has 12 teams and 15 games from Tuesday through Sunday. Here's an alternative that would accomplish the same goal of 12 teams AND only require 14 games AND guarantee that every game would matter. The top 4 seeds would play AT MOST 5 games. The lower 8 seeds could still play the dreaded 6-games but that's the price you pay. Plus since Thursday and Saturday only have 2 games scheduled, you have a little bit of a buffer should you encounter rain.

Round 1 - Play in (Single elimination)
Game 1: Tuesday - Seed 8 vs Seed 9
Game 2: Tuesday - Seed 5 vs Seed 12
Game 3: Tuesday - Seed 7 vs Seed 10
Game 4: Wednesday - Seed 6 vs Seed 11

Round 2 - Quarterfinals (Single elimination)
Game 5: Wednesday - Game 1 winner vs Seed 1
Game 6: Wednesday - Game 2 winner vs Seed 4
Game 7: Thursday - Game 3 winner vs Seed 2
Game 8: Thursday - Game 4 winner vs Seed 3

Semi Finals (Double elimination)
Game 9: Friday - Game 5 winner vs Game 6 winner
Game 10: Friday - Game 7 winner vs Game 8 winner
Game 11: Friday - Game 9 loser vs Game 10 loser (elimination game)
Game 12: Saturday - Game 9 winner vs Game 10 winner
Game 13: Saturday - Game 11 winner vs Game 12 loser (elimination game)

Championship (single elimination)
Game 14: Sunday - Game 12 winner vs Game 13 winner
 





FINAL FIELD OF 64 PROJECTION
In multiple-bid conferences, the automatic qualifier is listed first. Final RPI ranking is listed in parentheses.

America East (1): Binghamton (163)

American (2): East Carolina (66), UTSA (25)

ACC (9): North Carolina (6), Clemson (9), Florida State (14), Georgia Tech (21), Wake Forest (30), Duke (31), Louisville (32), NC State (34), Miami-Florida (41)

ASUN (1): Stetson (63)

Atlantic 10 (1): Rhode Island (68)

Big East (2): Creighton (46), UConn (40)

Big South (1): USC-Upstate (87)

Big Ten (4): Nebraska (51), UCLA (15), Oregon (16), USC (45)

Big XII (7): Arizona (27), TCU (18), Kansas (24), West Virginia (28), Cincinnati (33), Kansas State (37), Oklahoma State (44)

Big West (2): Cal Poly (29), UC-Irvine (23)

Coastal (1): Northeastern (22)

Conference USA (2): Western Kentucky (41), Dallas Baptist (20)

Horizon (1): Wright State (98)

Independent (1): Oregon State (7)

Ivy (1): Columbia (61)

MAAC (1): Fairfield (74)

MAC (1): Miami-Ohio (80)

Missouri Valley (1): Murray State (88)

Mountain West (1): Fresno State (102)

NEC (1): LIU (168)

OVC (1): Little Rock (243)

Patriot (1): Holy Cross (142)

SEC (13): Vanderbilt (1), Georgia (2), Auburn (3), Texas (4), Arkansas (5), LSU (10), Tennessee (11), Ole Miss (12), Alabama (13), Florida (17), Oklahoma (26), Mississippi State (35), Kentucky (38)

SoCon (1): East Tennessee State (36)

Southland (1): Houston Christian (91)

SWAC (1): Bethune-Cookman (198)

Summit (1): North Dakota State (140)

Sun Belt (2): Coastal Carolina (8), Southern Miss (19)

WCC (1): Saint Mary's (90)

WAC (1): Utah Valley (171)

Last 4 In: Cincinnati (33), UConn (40), Oklahoma State (44), (last team in) Kentucky (38)

First 4 Out: (first team out) Arizona State (49), Troy (47), Notre Dame (48), Texas A&M (50)

Next 4 Out: Xavier (39), UTRGV (43), Virginia (64), Southeastern Louisiana (54)

Multiple-Bid Conferences (9): SEC (13), ACC (9), Big XII (7), Big Ten (4), American (2), Big East (2), Big West (2), Conference USA (2), Sun Belt (2)
 
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Rooney’s girlfriend works in Chicago. Maybe he’ll take the free agent route to a school in the Land of Lincoln?
 

Big Ten gets 4 berths, including 2 regional hosts or first time ever. Thank you Pac12 schools. Still hope their addition will help the entire conference in the long run.
 

DarrenTheGreek said:
Big Ten gets 4 berths, including 2 regional hosts or first time ever. Thank you Pac12 schools. Still hope their addition will help the entire conference in the long run.
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Zero pre 2011 Big Ten teams made the ncaa baseball tournament. Big Ten expansion has been and will be a disaster for far-northern, legacy Big Ten programs like Minnesota for the two sports played on the diamond. A complete disaster.
 

ClassOf98Gopher said:
Zero pre 2011 Big Ten teams made the ncaa baseball tournament. Big Ten expansion has been and will be a disaster for far-northern, legacy Big Ten programs like Minnesota for the two sports played on the diamond. A complete disaster.
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I think the mid February start date for college baseball is the number one hindrance for northern teams. Over the years there has been talk of moving to a mid March start, but that brings it’s own issues for playing games after school has let out for the summer. But I think it would be great for both players and fans.
 


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