Rutgers rallies to stun No. 21 Nebraska 7-6 in extra innings
Rutgers rallied to stun No. 21 Nebraska 7-6 in 11 innings Friday night in Big Ten play. Head coach Steve Owens knew this was bound to happen at some point for the Scarlet Knights.
Johnny Volpe’s single up the middle in the bottom of the 11th capped off an epic comeback in Piscataway. It was only the second conference loss for the Huskers.
For Rutgers, it was a much needed Big Ten win and the Scarlet Knights earned it after trailing 6-3 going into the bottom of the ninth.
“We’ve been playing hard like, things haven’t gone our way,” Owens said postgame. “And we could have seven wins. We got two. But that’s a good win on a Friday against a really good team. That pitcher’s outstanding. We pitched competitively, made a mistake, two outs, gave up three runs. But the guys did a good job. We made some good plays and we got, whatever, 13 or 14 hits on a Friday night against a good team.”
The rally in the ninth started when Josh Kuroda-Grauer doubled into right center field, scoring Cam Love and RJ Johnson Jr. to cut the lead to one. Tony Santa-Maria drove in Cohen to tie things up and send it to extras.
“We’ve come back many times,” Owens said. “We just haven’t. We spent most of the year playing from in front and then we got in a rut and, you know, hopefully this will help get us out.”
Volpe was the hero though, delivering one of the more memorable moments of Rutgers’ season.
“He did a good job, staying inside the ball and shooting it through the middle,” Owens said of Volpe’s game winner. “So we had multiple opportunities, obviously, to do it. We had an opportunity during the ninth. We had an opportunity last Friday to do it in the ninth. And we’d be in a different spot because we would’ve won on Saturday too. But it is what it is. It’s a good win. We’ll build on it.”
Rutgers improved to 21-12 and 2-5 in the Big Ten with the win. Nebraska fell to 22-9 on the year, now 5-2 in conference play.
Moving forward, Rutgers and Nebraska play two more in their weekend series, starting with a 3:00 p.m. ET start Saturday and then a nationally televised 1:00 p.m. ET first pitch Sunday.