On Thursday Coach Tracy Smith shrugged off the fact they were going into the weekend playing a “struggling†Minnesota team. Four straight losses later, three of them to Minnesota, it’s easy to see why.
The rain held off in Bloomington this afternoon as the Red Hawks from Miami University out executed the Hoosiers nearly all day long.
It’s a bit of a head scratcher looking at the stats. IU was only outhit 13 to 11, but the final score still read to 10-3.
Also, for the 1st-3rd innings and 7th-9th innings IU outscored the Red Hawks 4-2; but in the 4th-6th innings IU was outscored 8-0.
IU responded to Miami’s one run lead with three of it’s own in the fourth inning, from there the wheels fell off.
In the 5th inning, Alex Dickerson stood on third and Dylan Swift on first with one out. Michael Basil then struck out, with Micah Johnson flying out in consecutive batters.
In the 6th inning, the Hoosiers looked to respond to Miami’s two run effort with Justin Cuerton’s leadoff single. Brian Lambert, up next with two strikes, went down swinging while Cuerton stole second, who was then tagged out a half second early.
In the 7th inning, Wes Wilson’s leadoff double was double was followed by three straight retired IU batters.
Coach addressed the mental mistakes after the game, “we have to get refocused on ‘let’s play good baseball, let’s be aggressive, let’s be tough minded’, whereas if I’m grading our performance today we weren’t very tough minded.â€
The Hoosiers will now have a few days off to get ready for a very important series in West Lafayette against Purdue, with both bragging rights and the confidence of a young team on the line.
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