Around the Horn: Nebraska baseball closes its regular season at Michigan State

It’s the final week of the regular season, and once again, Nebraska baseball has plenty on the line.

For the first time since 2021, a Big Ten regular season championship is within reach. There’s plenty to hash out in terms of seeding for next week’s Big Ten Tournament in Omaha as well.

The Huskers make their first trip to East Lansing in the last three seasons this weekend. The Michigan State Spartans (23-25, 10-11) are fighting for their postseason lives. A 21-3 drubbing at the hands of Minnesota last Saturday, followed by a blown 12-2 lead in a 15-12 loss on Sunday has put the Spartans squarely on the bubble for Omaha as the first team out.

According to head coach Will Bolt, Nebraska is sticking to its year-long process heading into another critical series.

“It kinda sounds boring but its kinda been the same mood we’ve had all year,” Bolt said. “It’s just day-to-day. We just come practice and do your thing and we’ll go practice tonight and show up to play a baseball game. There’s not a whole lot of ups and downs with this group.”

Here’s more on Nebraska’s championship scenarios, bursts from key arms late in the season, notes on both squads and much more.

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Projecting Nebraska’s pitching matchups

Thursday, 5:05 p.m. (Big Ten Plus), RHP Brett Sears (Stats: 7-0, 2.11 ERA, 85.1 IP, 83 K) vs. LHP Joseph Dzierwa (Stats: 6-1, 3.86 ERA, 77.0 IP, 80 K)

Friday, 4:00 p.m. (Big Ten Network), RHP Mason McConnaughey (Stats: 6-3, 3.09 ERA, 55.1 IP, 65 K) Vs. LHP Nick Powers (Stats: 6-4, 5.69 ERA, 74.1 IP, 59 K)

Saturday, 11:00 a.m. (Big Ten Network), LHP Jackson Brockett (2-0, 2.82 ERA, 22.1 IP, 20 K) Vs. TBA

What to watch for the Huskers

A Big Ten Championship on the line

There are three scenarios in which Nebraska clinches at least a share of a Big Ten Championship this weekend.

A sweep of Michigan State and two losses from Illinois in its series at Purdue gives the Huskers the top spot outright. Only one loss for the Fighting Illini or two losses combined with two Nebraska wins results in a share for each team. Should the two teams finish with the same Big Ten record, the Huskers hold a common opponents tiebreaker over Illinois and would receive the top seed in Omaha.

Much like NU’s 2021 squad, the Huskers could be celebrating away from home. There might not be much of a formal celebration at all. Nebraska has a charter flight home after the series finale and will take the chance to get home on Saturday night according to Bolt. All three Illinois-Purdue games this weekend follow Nebraska on the Big Ten Network.

There are of course other similarities between the Huskers’ last team to win a conference title and this year’s group. Garrett Anglim is a part of both teams.

“I think just the aspect of never giving up and I think what’s similar, too, is that everyone on the team works their butt off,” Anglim said. “Every freely available time they’re in the cages working on their craft. That’s a trait that’s carried over from that year that you can see and with that comes confidence.”

Angilm, who told the media he will be retiring from baseball to work for his father’s company at the end of the season, pointed to player leadership as another critical binding thread. Cole Evans and Josh Overbeek are standouts as well as Josh Caron, who Anglim said has been much more vocal this year.

The mantra from both players and coaches is the same as it has been all season. Just focus on the game ahead. While Bolt said it may seem blasé, but staying grounded in the present is how he believes his team has remained resilient all season.

“Baseball can lend itself to being such an emotional roller coaster if you allow it to, because there’s so much failure,” Bolt said. “Nobody goes 56-0. No pitcher pitches at a 0.00 ERA. Nobody hits 1.000. Nobody wins all the games they’re supposed to, very rarely. It’s just a very good characteristic to have. To have a group of guys that show up with a job to do every day.”

The importance of the rise of Brockett, Clark and Christo

Caleb Clark’s improbable resurgence is one of the most intriguing stories of the second half of Nebraska’s season.

In his last nine outings, he owns a 3.86 ERA of 18 2/3 innings of work with 23 strikeouts to eight walks. Clark has held the opposition to a .179 batting average and surrendered eight earned runs in that stretch. There have been some mechanical changes. Pitching coach Rob Childress shifted Clark closer to the first-base side of the mound and had him incorporate more two-seem fastballs than four-seamers.

Constant support from the Huskers’ coaching staff over the course of Clark’s sometimes rocky career has been important, too.

“Going through adversity is something that until you do it, you can’t actually explain it,” Clark said. “Going through last year, the coaches having my back and going into conversations with them and the first thing being them saying, ‘Hey, we love you and we want you to be here,’ that’s one of the things I’ve always loved about Nebraska. Through two years, I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”

Overcoming adversity together has made Clark closer with teammates like Drew Christo and Jackson Brockett. That trio will likely find themselves on the hill in critical moments this weekend and beyond as the Huskers enter the postseason.

“It’s valuable because then you’re looking at using two-three guys in a game and not having to make five or six moves to finish a game off,” Bolt said. “If you can do that, you have everything set up for the third game or fourth game if it comes to that.”

Nebraska notes:

***Bolt said second baseman Cayden Brumbaugh didn’t feel good Sunday and hasn’t swung a bat this week so that he can “save his bullets” for the weekend. He will hit at the Huskers’ practice in East Lansing tonight. Brumbaugh is still recovering from an injury he sustained during the Iowa series.

***Brett Sears has logged double-digit quality starts this year making him the first Nebraska arm to do so since Chance Sinclair posted 12 in 2014. Five other Huskers have recorded 10 or more quality starts in a single season.

***Only seven other catchers nationwide have matched or exceeded Josh Caron’s .310 batting average with a minimum of 24 extra-base hits and 52 RBIs.

***Nebraska’s 86 stolen bases this season are the most for the program since the 2003 Huskers swiped 90 bags. At a 78.2% success rate, NU currently has its seventh-best efficiency ever.

***Dylan Carey has raised his batting average from .236 to .258 over the course of a 21-game span in which he has hits in 14 of those contests. Meanwhile, Case Sanderson’s .511 on-base percentage is the second-best in the Big Ten and 21st in the country. He has reached in 21 of his last 22 games.

***Angilm on the upward slope in right field at Kobs Field:

“Yeah, it’s pretty hard to forget. You’re just going back to the wall and all of a sudden you’re going up hill. It’s something special but you won’t forget it. You’ll know you’re close to the wall for sure.”

Know the foe: Michigan State

***Nebraska holds a 18-10 advantage in the all-time series with the Spartans. The Huskers are traveling to East Lansing for the first time since 2021’s 2-1 series win. NU last met Michigan State at the Big Ten Tournament last year when Will Walsh tossed a complete-game shutout in a 4-0 victory.

***Michigan State pitching coach Mark Van Ameyde was away from the team from March 20-April 26 while undergoing and recovering from a successful kidney transplant. Van Ameyde is a seven-year vet on the Spartan coaching staff and his wife Melissa was his donor.

***This year is the 70th anniversary of Michigan State’s first and only team to reach the College World Series. The 1954 Spartans finished 25-10-1, won the Big Ten Championship and the first two games of its CWS run before losing two of its last three games.

***Freshman infielder Ryan McKay is in the midst of a 16-game hitting streak, which ties the longest by a MSU bat since Trent Farquhar last year. Mitch Jebb represents the next-longest streak at 21 games from May of 2021 to March of 2022.

***Player to watch: OF Jack Frank

The senior from Strongsville, Ohio, leads the team in five offensive categories (batting average, hits, runs, triples and home runs) and is second in two more (RBIs, walks). This is Frank’s fifth season of college ball and his .369 average at the dish is roughly .070 better than his previous career high. He also has five outfield assists this year.

Around the Big Ten

Here are a few Big Ten series to keep tabs on this weekend as well as the conference standings. Records are as of Wednesday evening:

Series:

Illinois (30-17, 15-6) @ Purdue (33-19, 13-8)

Michigan (29-24, 13-8) @ Indiana (28-21-1, 13-8)

Penn State (23-23, 9-12) @ Maryland (34-19, 10-11)

Standings:

Broadcast Information

TV: Big Ten Network/Big Ten Plus: HERE/HERE

Radio: Huskers Radio Network (Radio simulcast found HERE)

Stations: Lincoln (1400 AM), Omaha (590 AM)