MSU baseball bounces back with 9-0 win over IU
EAST LANSING - The Michigan State baseball team defeated Indiana, 9-0, on Saturday afternoon to improve to 27-9 on the season and 8-3 in the Big Ten. The Spartans sent 12 batters to the plate in a seven-run sixth inning that broke open the game and secured the victory.
Starter Ethan Landon earned the win, going 7.2 scoreless innings, allowing just five hits and striking out six to improve to 5-1 on the year. In the junior’s longest outing of the season, he held Indiana (22-15, 7-4) to just one hit from the third to the eighth inning.
“I thought Ethan was really good today,” said MSU head coach Jake Boss Jr. “The longer the game went on, the better he got. He kind of played with fire early, but he got some double play balls that gave him some momentum and allowed him to feel more comfortable. He cruised after that and it was good to get him deep into the game.”
Junior Dan Durkin got the big sixth inning started with a leadoff homer sent over the wall in right. The Spartans then went station-to-station with six straight batters reaching on five singles and a walk. Matt Byars, Justin Hovis, Brandon Hughes and Jordan Zimmerman all picked up RBIs before Kris Simonton capped off the scoring barrage with a two-RBI single through the left side to make it 9-0.
MSU had a string of solid defensive plays to keep the Hoosiers off the board early in the game, starting in the second inning with a perfect relay from Simonton to Zimmerman to Byars to throw out IU’s Austin Cangelosi at the plate for the final out of the inning. The Spartans then got double plays in both the fourth and fifth innings to escape a bases loaded and first and third jam.
Michigan State gained the lead in the second fame after Taylor Grace walked to start the inning and scored on a groundout to third. Brandon Hughes then walked to start the third and came around to score on a safety squeeze executed by Marty Bechina.
“I thought we executed early on in the game and were a hit away there from scoring some runs, but we executed a few things in the sixth and got a big inning to pull away,” said Boss.
Riley McCauley pitched a perfect 1.1 innings in relief to finish out the game. The shutout was the Spartans fifth as a team this season and second in as many weekends.
IU starter Caleb Baragar took the loss and is now 3-2 on the year. Bringing the Big Ten’s second best ERA entering today’s game, the Spartans got to the lefty for four earned runs on six hits.
MSU outhit Indiana 12-5, led by Durkin, Bechina, Simonton and Hovis, who all had multiple hits. Bechina knocked in three runs and Byars extended his hitting streak to 12 games with an RBI single in the sixth.
The rubber match of the series will take place tomorrow at 3 p.m. and will air live on BTN.
-MSU athletic communications