Northwestern Baseball Avoids Sweep in Dramatic Fashion
With two outs in the bottom of the ninth on Sunday, Iowa and Northwestern were locked in a 4-4 tie. The bases were juiced. NU's Ryan Kucherak, who walked off Illinois earlier this season, stepped to the plate with an opportunity to deliver in the clutch once again.
On a 1-1 pitch from Hawkeye reliever Chas Wheatley, Kucherak came through, crushing a ball to left-center that landed just out of the reach of Ben Wilmes, the Iowa left fielder.
WALKOFF WINNER! 'CATS WIN! pic.twitter.com/XmStVQsP0G
— Northwestern Baseball (@NUCatsBaseball) April 6, 2025
Northwestern's 5-4 victory was its first of the weekend series against Iowa after two rough losses. The Wildcats fell 12-1 on Friday and 7-1 on Saturday, suffering from poor pitching and a couple bad days at the plate.
But the bats came alive a little bit more on Sunday, and starting pitcher Matthew Kouser delivered a solid start to move Northwestern's overall record to 14-15 and its conference record to 6-6. The freshman has had an up-and-down season but turned in five innings of one-run ball against Iowa.
Reliever Blake MacMillan went the rest of the way. He did cough up a 3-1 lead, allowing three earned runs in four innings of work, but he never let Iowa get ahead and got the win thanks to Kucherak's heroics.
Two of MacMillan's three runs allowed came in the sixth inning to tie the score at three. But the Wildcats punched back in the eighth when Trent Liolios sent one over the wall in right field. Iowa evened the score once more in the top of the ninth, but Kucherak had the last laugh.
The sophomore shortstop is hitting .236 with six bombs and a .323 on base percentage this season. His numbers don't jump off the page, but Kucherak has been solid and clearly has the clutch gene.
Sitting at .500 in conference through 12 games, this Northwestern team is continuing to prove that it is much improved from recent previous squads. At this point, the sample size has grown enough that it isn't just by chance.
The Wildcats will be back in action this week on Tuesday for a standalone game in South Bend against Notre Dame. They will then stay on the road and take on Michigan State next weekend.
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Ryan Cole is a writer for Northwestern Wildcats On SI covering every team on campus. He’s currently a junior at NU where he’s studying journalism and previously wrote and edited for Inside NU. He also studies business with an eye towards eventually helping develop business models to revive local news. In his free time, Cole enjoys watching sports, playing sports, reading the news and singing.