IU Looking to Cash in its Chip
5/27/2019 9:50:00 PM | Baseball
By Andy Graham
IUHoosiers.com
BLOOMINGTON, IND. – Confident.
But with a chip on the shoulder.
"Yeah," junior centerfielder Matt Gorski acknowledged with a smile Monday. "Exactly."
That seems a good characterization of Indiana's No. 24-ranked Hoosiers as they begin NCAA baseball tournament play at this weekend's Louisville regional.
The Hoosiers are both buoyed by steadfastly earning the Big Ten regular-season championship and more than a bit miffed by an 0-2 showing in last weekend's Big Ten Tournament.
Indiana (36-21) opens regional play against Missouri Valley Conference co-champ Illinois State (34-24) at 2 p.m. Friday, followed by No. 8 Louisville (43-15) against Illinois-Chicago (29-21) at 6 p.m. The format is double-elimination.
The Hoosiers hope to resemble more closely the club that overcame a 7-8 start to win eight straight games, then win 9 of 10 series down the stretch – including the sweep of Rutgers that capped the regular-season campaign to secure the outright league title by a half-game.
"This is probably a bad analogy, but you have those last couple of weekends where you kind of smell blood in the water and you go hunt for it," Hoosier head honcho Jeff Mercer said Monday of the regular-season stretch drive. "We have to get to where we're like that every day.
"And the reality is, we haven't been. We've fluctuated. That part, we have to work that out and we have to get rid of that. But, yeah … it's back where it is do or die.
"The life of this team is now in the balance every time you play. And someone is trying to end your life – they're trying to end your season, end your career. And we have to make sure we play with that urgency again."
Illinois State, the team now trying to put the Hoosiers on life-support at Louisville's 4,000-seat Jim Patterson Stadium, has some interesting parallels with IU.
Mercer was the Big Ten Coach of the Year and his squad featured both the league's Pitcher of the Year in Andrew Saalfrank and one of the top players in the league in Matt Lloyd.
Illinois State's Steve Helm was the Missouri Valley Conference Coach of the Year and Redbird rightfielder Joe Aeilts was the MVC Player of the Year and lefty Brent Headrick was the MVC Pitcher of the Year.
Headrick (9-3, 3.50 ERA and 101 strikeouts in 90 innings pitched) figures to start against IU, which has four left-handed bats in its regular lineup.
The 6-foot-6 Headrick has allowed zero earned runs in three of his last seven starts – never allowing more than three runs, and compiling a combined ERA of 1.31 over than stretch.
"Their Friday guy is a lefty, if he were to throw against us, (and he) has good numbers," Mercer said of Headrick. "Is more of a 'pitchability' guy, which we've struggled with in the past.
"We're going to have to go out and be good. I know they're going to be really well-coached. You don't go out and win in the Missouri Valley (and not be tough). It's a terrific conference."
Just who Indiana will start is an open question. Senior workhorse Pauly Milto is the regular Friday starter, and his last NCAA appearance was a nine-inning shutout at Texas Southern in the Texas regional.
IU has normally then gone with Tanner Gordon on Saturday and Saalfrank on Sunday.
"A lot of it will depend upon what the breakdown says with the matchups for our opponents," Mercer said. "I guess if you were going to take one positive from our poor performance last weekend, it's that now we really have the flexibility to do whatever we want with whoever we want. And match up.
"(We'll look at) their matchups against righties and lefties, how they are against sinkers and high RPM guys, and match it up. Milto is going to be in the first couple of games, certainly, and then everyone else falls in behind that. You want to put Pauly in position to be the most successful he can be, whether it's the first game or the second game, and we'll kind of make a decision based upon the numbers."
Illinois State can hit the ball. The team batting average is .295 and the Redbirds have whacked 50 homers.
Aeilts is batting .350 with 10 homers and 46 RBI along with 13 stolen bases in 14 attempts. Joining him as All-MVC First-Team performers are teammates John Rave (.304, 12 HR, 48 RBI, 11 SB) and Joe Butler (.323, 5 HR, 41 RBI).
Jordan Libman (.309) and Second-Team All-MVC selection Jack Butler (.304) are also hitting better than .300.
Indiana's has just one such hitter, with sophomore Elijah Dunham surging of late to lift his mark to .305.
The Hoosiers have hit 90 home runs (second nationally behind only the 92 hit by Arizona State, coached by former Hoosier mentor Tracy Smith).
If there was a silver lining to the showing out in Omaha, it was that exiting early gave Indiana a full week to prepare for the regional.
"I would have much rather gone out there and played well, like we all would've," Mercer said of the Big Ten Tournament. "But at the same time, I'm the eternal optimist and I know that, so we're going to sit down as a staff and use this to our advantage and our benefit to get these guys ready.
"We've had our longest, hardest practices of the year the last couple days, and we will again the next couple days. You have to use every second. You have to use every minute. For us (it was useful) to have a couple days to go back and rewatch those guys and really break down every piece of it and diagnose our issues and be able to put a practice plan together to attack those things."
The Hoosiers will look to simplify their offensive attack.
"I told the guys yesterday that, when we hit home runs, it's not that we ever have, like, four hits and three are home runs and we score six runs," Mercer said. "It's when we have, like, 12 hits and three of them happen to be home runs.
"When you get into good counts and hit balls on the barrel and you strike them true enough, some of them just happen to go over the fence. So we have to be simple enough (with our approach) and be focused enough just to put the ball on the barrel. Get in good counts. Be competitive with two strikes. That's when we have success."
Mercer can deploy several veterans who've already experienced some success at the NCAA regional level.
The Hoosiers, making their sixth NCAA appearance in seven years, nearly upended No. 14-ranked host Texas last year, falling 3-2 in the regional title game. Before that, Indiana sidelined No. 25 Texas A&M in the semifinals.
During four games in Austin, five regulars in the current Indiana lineup – Gorski, DH-closer Lloyd, first-baseman Scotty Bradley, catcher Ryan Fineman and shortstop Justin Walker – combined to hit .300 (24 of 80) with 12 runs scored, 11 RBI, six doubles, three homers and five steals.
Junior lefty Saalfrank pitched into the sixth against the host Longhorns with a 2-1 lead and fanned 11 hitters, overall, in 7 2/3 innings of work in Austin. Milto had his complete-game shutout. Junior righty Cal Krueger allowed just one hit in four innings of scoreless relief.
"It certainly helps that the players here have played for the most part in a regional," Mercer said. "I think it's always important to reiterate what is successful in these type of tournaments: It's the team that's the best with two strikes and two outs, the team that can go out and execute the best."
Because teams will use their entire pitching arsenal to survive and advance.
"In the conference schedule, you can play a little bit different style," Mercer said. " … You're going to get somebody's third or fourth reliever, you're going to play against that range the spectrum of the conference. If you don't win a Friday, you can still win a conference championship.
"These games will be different. They'll be tight. All the teams here are either playing their best baseball at the end of the season or they've put a body of work together that secured them a bid in this tournament. So everybody will be very good, everybody will be fully prepared to have success in these types of deals.
"It's certainly exciting. This time of the year is always a lot of fun … you kind of have an idea of what to expect. It's exciting, but it's also to be expected. That's what we work every day for. Looking forward to going out and putting our best foot forward."
If the Hoosiers do that, confidence is warranted.
But until they do that, so is that chip on the shoulder.
IUHoosiers.com
BLOOMINGTON, IND. – Confident.
But with a chip on the shoulder.
"Yeah," junior centerfielder Matt Gorski acknowledged with a smile Monday. "Exactly."
That seems a good characterization of Indiana's No. 24-ranked Hoosiers as they begin NCAA baseball tournament play at this weekend's Louisville regional.
The Hoosiers are both buoyed by steadfastly earning the Big Ten regular-season championship and more than a bit miffed by an 0-2 showing in last weekend's Big Ten Tournament.
Indiana (36-21) opens regional play against Missouri Valley Conference co-champ Illinois State (34-24) at 2 p.m. Friday, followed by No. 8 Louisville (43-15) against Illinois-Chicago (29-21) at 6 p.m. The format is double-elimination.
The Hoosiers hope to resemble more closely the club that overcame a 7-8 start to win eight straight games, then win 9 of 10 series down the stretch – including the sweep of Rutgers that capped the regular-season campaign to secure the outright league title by a half-game.
"This is probably a bad analogy, but you have those last couple of weekends where you kind of smell blood in the water and you go hunt for it," Hoosier head honcho Jeff Mercer said Monday of the regular-season stretch drive. "We have to get to where we're like that every day.
"And the reality is, we haven't been. We've fluctuated. That part, we have to work that out and we have to get rid of that. But, yeah … it's back where it is do or die.
"The life of this team is now in the balance every time you play. And someone is trying to end your life – they're trying to end your season, end your career. And we have to make sure we play with that urgency again."
Illinois State, the team now trying to put the Hoosiers on life-support at Louisville's 4,000-seat Jim Patterson Stadium, has some interesting parallels with IU.
Mercer was the Big Ten Coach of the Year and his squad featured both the league's Pitcher of the Year in Andrew Saalfrank and one of the top players in the league in Matt Lloyd.
Illinois State's Steve Helm was the Missouri Valley Conference Coach of the Year and Redbird rightfielder Joe Aeilts was the MVC Player of the Year and lefty Brent Headrick was the MVC Pitcher of the Year.
Headrick (9-3, 3.50 ERA and 101 strikeouts in 90 innings pitched) figures to start against IU, which has four left-handed bats in its regular lineup.
The 6-foot-6 Headrick has allowed zero earned runs in three of his last seven starts – never allowing more than three runs, and compiling a combined ERA of 1.31 over than stretch.
"Their Friday guy is a lefty, if he were to throw against us, (and he) has good numbers," Mercer said of Headrick. "Is more of a 'pitchability' guy, which we've struggled with in the past.
"We're going to have to go out and be good. I know they're going to be really well-coached. You don't go out and win in the Missouri Valley (and not be tough). It's a terrific conference."
Just who Indiana will start is an open question. Senior workhorse Pauly Milto is the regular Friday starter, and his last NCAA appearance was a nine-inning shutout at Texas Southern in the Texas regional.
IU has normally then gone with Tanner Gordon on Saturday and Saalfrank on Sunday.
"A lot of it will depend upon what the breakdown says with the matchups for our opponents," Mercer said. "I guess if you were going to take one positive from our poor performance last weekend, it's that now we really have the flexibility to do whatever we want with whoever we want. And match up.
"(We'll look at) their matchups against righties and lefties, how they are against sinkers and high RPM guys, and match it up. Milto is going to be in the first couple of games, certainly, and then everyone else falls in behind that. You want to put Pauly in position to be the most successful he can be, whether it's the first game or the second game, and we'll kind of make a decision based upon the numbers."
Illinois State can hit the ball. The team batting average is .295 and the Redbirds have whacked 50 homers.
Aeilts is batting .350 with 10 homers and 46 RBI along with 13 stolen bases in 14 attempts. Joining him as All-MVC First-Team performers are teammates John Rave (.304, 12 HR, 48 RBI, 11 SB) and Joe Butler (.323, 5 HR, 41 RBI).
Jordan Libman (.309) and Second-Team All-MVC selection Jack Butler (.304) are also hitting better than .300.
Indiana's has just one such hitter, with sophomore Elijah Dunham surging of late to lift his mark to .305.
The Hoosiers have hit 90 home runs (second nationally behind only the 92 hit by Arizona State, coached by former Hoosier mentor Tracy Smith).
If there was a silver lining to the showing out in Omaha, it was that exiting early gave Indiana a full week to prepare for the regional.
"I would have much rather gone out there and played well, like we all would've," Mercer said of the Big Ten Tournament. "But at the same time, I'm the eternal optimist and I know that, so we're going to sit down as a staff and use this to our advantage and our benefit to get these guys ready.
"We've had our longest, hardest practices of the year the last couple days, and we will again the next couple days. You have to use every second. You have to use every minute. For us (it was useful) to have a couple days to go back and rewatch those guys and really break down every piece of it and diagnose our issues and be able to put a practice plan together to attack those things."
The Hoosiers will look to simplify their offensive attack.
"I told the guys yesterday that, when we hit home runs, it's not that we ever have, like, four hits and three are home runs and we score six runs," Mercer said. "It's when we have, like, 12 hits and three of them happen to be home runs.
"When you get into good counts and hit balls on the barrel and you strike them true enough, some of them just happen to go over the fence. So we have to be simple enough (with our approach) and be focused enough just to put the ball on the barrel. Get in good counts. Be competitive with two strikes. That's when we have success."
Mercer can deploy several veterans who've already experienced some success at the NCAA regional level.
The Hoosiers, making their sixth NCAA appearance in seven years, nearly upended No. 14-ranked host Texas last year, falling 3-2 in the regional title game. Before that, Indiana sidelined No. 25 Texas A&M in the semifinals.
During four games in Austin, five regulars in the current Indiana lineup – Gorski, DH-closer Lloyd, first-baseman Scotty Bradley, catcher Ryan Fineman and shortstop Justin Walker – combined to hit .300 (24 of 80) with 12 runs scored, 11 RBI, six doubles, three homers and five steals.
Junior lefty Saalfrank pitched into the sixth against the host Longhorns with a 2-1 lead and fanned 11 hitters, overall, in 7 2/3 innings of work in Austin. Milto had his complete-game shutout. Junior righty Cal Krueger allowed just one hit in four innings of scoreless relief.
"It certainly helps that the players here have played for the most part in a regional," Mercer said. "I think it's always important to reiterate what is successful in these type of tournaments: It's the team that's the best with two strikes and two outs, the team that can go out and execute the best."
Because teams will use their entire pitching arsenal to survive and advance.
"In the conference schedule, you can play a little bit different style," Mercer said. " … You're going to get somebody's third or fourth reliever, you're going to play against that range the spectrum of the conference. If you don't win a Friday, you can still win a conference championship.
"These games will be different. They'll be tight. All the teams here are either playing their best baseball at the end of the season or they've put a body of work together that secured them a bid in this tournament. So everybody will be very good, everybody will be fully prepared to have success in these types of deals.
"It's certainly exciting. This time of the year is always a lot of fun … you kind of have an idea of what to expect. It's exciting, but it's also to be expected. That's what we work every day for. Looking forward to going out and putting our best foot forward."
If the Hoosiers do that, confidence is warranted.
But until they do that, so is that chip on the shoulder.
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