Indiana Baseball: Bothwell Leads Hoosiers to 3rd Straight Win
MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. – Indiana got another outstanding pitching performance on Sunday, this time from Ty Bothwell as the Hoosiers beat Minnesota 8-1 for their third straight win on opening weekend.
Bothwell, a redshirt freshman from Hebron, Ind., was sensational in his first career start at Indiana. He had a career-high 10 strikeouts in just five innings, allowing one earned run on two hits to get the win.
It was the third straight win at U.S. Bank Stadium for the Hoosiers, who lost their opener to Rutgers 2-1 on Friday but then ripped off three impressive wins over Minnesota (5-2), Rutgers (4-2) and this 8-1 win.
The winning streak has been highlighted by great starting pitching. Bothwell was the third straight starter to record at least 10 strikeouts, following Tommy Sommer and McCade Brown with impressive outings.
The bullpen was solid once again, too, with Nathan Stahl pitching three scoreless innings in his season debut and Matt Litwicki pitching a perfect ninth inning to close out the game. He was perfect on Saturday as well in picking up a save over Rutgers.
Indiana's bats came alive on Sunday, too, with the top five batters in the order doing most of the damage.
Designated hitter Drew Ashley was 2-for-5 and hit his first home run of the season. He has now reached base in 29 consecutive games dating back to 2019.
Center fielder Grant Richardson was 3-for-5 with three doubles and third baseman Cole Barr was 2-for-3 with a walk and three runs scored.
Second baseman Paul Toetz was 1-for-3 with two walks and three RBIs. He hit a two-run homer in the first inning. First baseman Jordan Fucci was 2-for-5 with two RBIs.
Over the weekend, the Indiana pitching staff posted a 1.80 earned run average and struck out 50 batters in 35 innings pitched. They allowed only seven runs and 15 hits in four games.
Through the first weekend, Indiana is tied for first in the Big Ten at 3-1. Michigan State, Ohio State and Nebraska also went 3-1 over the first weekend.
Indiana is back home for four games next weekend in this Big Ten-only schedule. The Hoosiers will play four games against Penn State at Bart Kaufman Field, starting at 1 p.m. ET on Friday. The two teams will play a doubleheader on Saturday starting at Noon ET and a single game on Sunday, starting at 1 p.m.
Penn State went 2-2 during the opening weekend, splitting a series with Northwestern at U.S. Bank Stadium, too.
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