This Iowa baseball team never quits.

Every time they are down, they fight back, and they do not always get it done, but they will not go quietly.

Today was just another example and today it ended with an Iowa 12-9 come from behind win.

Rick Heller was really happy with what he saw saying, “It really makes you proud as a coach, when you have a team that doesn’t quit, keeps fighting, no matter what the situation is.”

Duncan Davitt started on the mound for the Hawkeyes today and he put together a really solid day on the mound despite allowing a few long ball home runs. The game got off to rough start when Stephen Hrustich, David Dunn and Ethan O’Donnell combined for three solo home runs to give the Cats a 3-0 lead after two innings.

Iowa responded in the bottom of the second with a sacrifice fly from Dylan Nedved, which scored Zeb Adreon, who led off the inning with a triple. Between the third and fifth inning, Davitt would retire eight straight batters. It allowed the Hawkeyes to chip their way back into the game. In the fourth, the Hawkeyes would get some help from a couple of Wildcat errors and Brayden Frazier would cut the lead to 3-2 on a sacrifice fly. Then in the fifth inning, Izaya Fullard would send a deep shot off the batter’s eye in center field to tie the game at 3.

Stephen Hrustich would respond, in the sixth, with his second home run of the game, putting Northwestern up 4-3, but Davitt would keep the rest of the inning scoreless. Duncan Davitt would throw 6 innings, allowing four runs on five hits, while striking out five. When you unpack his stat line, you see that he really had a solid outing.

Rick Heller echoed that in his postgame press conference saying, “Duncan was tremendous…you look at it, he gives up four solo home runs, but he didn’t turn it into two walks and a three-run home run…on a day like today that’s what gets you beat.”

In the bottom of the sixth, Iowa would get back-to-back runners on via walk to start the inning, with Ben Norman coming to the plate. Norman would hit a long fly to left field and David Dunn would rob him of a home run, but it was a sacrifice fly, and the game was tied 4. The following at bat Izaya Fullard would line one to RF Leo Kaplan, but Kaplan would miss the sliding catch, allowing Matthew Sosa to score. Iowa took a 5-4 lead into the seventh, but it would not last long.

Trace Hoffman came on in relief of Davitt and struggled mightily. After a hit by pitch, Leo Kaplan would triple down the right field line to tie the game at 5 and then Evan Minarovic would single in Kaplan to put the Cats up 6-5. Later in the inning, the long ball struck again and this time it was Shawn Goosenberg. The two-run shot put Northwestern up 8-5 and knocked Trace Hoffman from the game.

Dylan Nedved would come in and retire five of six batters to get through the eighth inning and give Iowa a shot to comeback. “I think it’s a part of our culture, we always have a never give up attitude. We want to be as tough as possible all the time,” said Ben Norman on the team’s ability to always fight back. The top of the eighth began with a Brendan Sher double and a Ben Norman walk, which brought in Reed Smith from the Northwestern bullpen. Trenton Wallace and Austin Martin would bring in two runs with back-to-back singles, cutting the lead to 8-7. Then with the bases loaded, Brayden Frazier would fly out to right field, which scored Wallace, to tie the game at 8.

In the top of the ninth, Nedved began to run out of steam, as he allowed back-to-back hits from Anthony Calarco and Shawn Goosenberg to give the Cats a 9-8 lead. Nedved would battle out of the inning and give Iowa a chance to tie or win in the bottom of the ninth. Coach Heller mentioned Dylan’s performance saying, “He was kind running out of gas…It was a really tough predicament that we were in…Glad we let Dylan ride it out, he found a way to gut through it.”

In the bottom of the ninth, Brendan Sher would get his second double of the game with one out and Ben Norman followed with a single to tie the game at 9. After an Izaya Fullard single, Coach Heller elected to bring in Brett McCleary to pinch hit and it paid off. McCleary took a Reed Smith slider deep to right field and over the wall for an incredible walk off win. “I talked to Marty (Sutherland) right before the at bat, that guy was throwing a lot of sliders…He left it up, so I got my best swing on it,” said McCleary on his walk off.

Rick Heller spoke on the decision to put McCleary in the game saying, “It wasn’t an easy decision…We knew McCleary has had some big hits for us…I felt like the matchup with the pitcher he was facing, he was going to something out over the plate, more than likely a breaking ball and he does a really nice job of staying on those.”

The Hawkeyes move to 18-11 on the season and take three of four on the weekend. The win likely kept Iowa on the right side of the bubble down the stretch, as the head to Indiana next weekend. “We can celebrate today, celebrate tonight, but big focus is coming up next week. We got Indiana…Taking it one game at a time, one series at a time,” said Ben Norman on the buzz of today’s win and possible postseason buzz.

Notes

- Iowa trailed or were tied in eight out of nine innings.

- Ben Norman extended his on base streak to 18 games.

- Zeb Adreon reached base 13 times over the four-game weekend

- Iowa did the small things at the plate, scoring four runs via sacrifice fly

- The game featured seven home runs. Five by Northwestern and two by Iowa.

- Iowa has won five straight series.