After a couple of high scoring games to open the series, tonight’s game had the feel of a postseason game. The Hawkeyes and Hoosiers battled in a low scoring affair for nine innings with tense moments galore. Ultimately, Iowa picked up the 2-1 victory to earn a sweep in their final series of the season.

While a 12-0 win is stressless and fun, tense moments down the stretch in tonight’s game can pay dividends with the Big Ten Tournament sitting on the horizon.

“That’s real good point. That’s what we talked about (in the locker room). We needed one of them and we needed to have a grinder and find a way to get it done,” said Coach Rick Heller. “Some tough situations and we fought out of it.”

“Everyone got really loud at some point tonight,” said Ben Beutel. “It was good to get in that type of atmosphere.”

The Hawkeyes took an early lead on a solo home run from Keaton Anthony in the first inning. Anthony now has 14 on the season and hit one in each game of the series. However, from that point on the Iowa offense could not muster many hits. Credit the Indiana pitching staff for slowing down the Hawkeyes after allowing 42 runs in the first two games of the weekend.

Bradley Brehmer, Ty Bothwell and Reese Sharp held the Iowa lineup to just three hits on the night. Bothwell struck out six in two innings of work and left the bases loaded in fifth inning when the Hawkeyes were looking to blow it open. They mustered just one run on a wild pitch that scored Kyle Huckstorf to make it 2-0. From there, it was up to the pitching staff to hang on for the victory.

Ty Langenberg made the start on the mound and while he didn’t have his best stuff, the sophomore battled hard for 5.0 innings. He allowed multiple baserunners in three of his five innings, but was able to work around the traffic and held the Hoosiers scoreless.

“Obviously, it wasn’t my best outing. I didn’t have my best stuff with me,” said Langenberg. “I kept missing with my slider, so we had to resort to a fastball/cutter combo, mixing in a couple changeups…Overall, I was just very pleased with how I was able to work out of those situations and make do with what I had.”

After a rough start last week in East Lansing, it was important for Ty to bounce back with a solid outing with his biggest start of the season coming next week in Omaha.

“It means everything. I knew coming into the day that this game meant a lot. I feel like I have a tendency to rise to occasion and I think positively in those situations,” said Langenberg. “It felt good to just come out and compete. Just push that worry to the back of my mind.”

Connor Schultz allowed a solo home run to Matthew Ellis in the sixth inning, which cut the lead to 2-1, but overall, he had a good outing. Schultz gave the Hawkeyes 2.0 innings, including three strikeouts and much like Langenberg, it was good to see him have a good outing with postseason on deck.

Iowa turned it over to Ben Beutel to try to nail down the last six outs and it did not come without a good bit of stress. In the eighth, the Hoosiers got the first two runners on base, but Beutel stepped up struck out three straight batters to get out of the jam.

Then in the ninth, Indiana loaded the bases with two singles and walk, which put the tying run just 90 feet from home. Beutel buckled down once again and got Carter Mathison looking for strike three to collect the second out of the inning. He then got Josh Pyne to send a lazy fly ball to right field, which was gathered by Keaton Anthony and the Hawkeyes pulled out the 2-1 victory.

“Confidence. It all goes back to it,” said Beutel. “When you’re feeling like “ahhh things are speeding up”, you’ve got to take a step back, know your abilities and know you’re going to get out of it.”

With the win, the Hawkeyes move to 33-17 on the season and finish the year at 17-7 in Big Ten play. Iowa jumps up to #57 in the RPI rankings and find themselves in good position as they head to Omaha for the Big Ten Tournament. The win clinched the #3 seed for the Hawkeyes, and they will take on #6 Penn State in the opener on Wednesday. The game is bright and early at 9:00am, which means the Hawkeyes and Nittany Lions will be kicking off the festivities in Omaha. The game will be televised on the Big Ten Network.