ANN ARBOR, Michigan — BGSU baseball (15-24, 8-13) loses a close game to the University of Michigan Wolverines (25-15, 10-8), 9-6, on a Wednesday night at Ray Fisher Stadium.
Bowling Green has lost the last eight games against Michigan, with the last victory happening on April 22, 2014. This is also the fourth straight loss for BGSU, dating back to the series against the University of Massachusetts.
The Falcon offense only scored in two of the innings in today’s game. Scoring five runs in the fourth inning after an offensive explosion that saw Sam Seidel cap it off with a three-run home run. The only other run for the Falcons came in the seventh inning, scoring one run after a fielder’s choice.
“They came up here with something to prove,” said head coach Kyle Hallock. “It was nice to see the five-spot in the top of the fourth and get some quality offense going … but we’ve got to put 100% of the innings together.”
After almost two full innings of scoreless play, the Wolverines opened the scoring with one out in the second inning. Bringing home one runner after a bases-loaded bunt by Drew Culbertson forced a throw to home plate, the throw from Luke Krouse brought Lance Vickers off the bag, and after video review, the runner was ruled safe. They followed that up by scoring another runner off a sacrifice fly to right-center field, extending their lead to 2-0 after two innings.
Michigan added to their lead through a deep double to the left field wall by Josh Campbell, clearing the loaded bases and extending the Wolverine lead to 5-0.
Campbell was then brought home by Culbertson off a suicide squeeze bunt that saw Campbell breaking for home plate as soon as Krouse started his wind-up, bringing the score to 6-0.
“The four pitchers that went out today, combined, they probably want six at-bats back, one or two each. That’s the difference,” said Hallock.
The Falcons picked up their first run of the day in the fourth inning. With the bases loaded and zero outs, Carter Mottice hit a ball to deep center field, good for a sacrifice fly, scoring TJ Takats and shrinking the Michigan lead to 6-1.
Bowling Green added a second run through a sacrifice fly hit by Vickers that brought home Zack Horky and put the score at 6-2.
Seidel then picked up his biggest hit of the season since the win against Ohio State on April 7. Hitting a three-run home run just over the right field wall, scoring runners from first and second, and putting BGSU back into the game with a score of 6-5.
In the fifth, Michigan responded with a run of its own after a bases-loaded walk brought home Greg Pace Jr. and enlarged the lead to 7-5.
Bowling Green scored again in the seventh inning, adding a run after a fielder’s choice hit by Takats scored Andrew Dilodovico and shrunk the Michigan lead to 7-6.
Michigan extended its lead once again in the seventh. Scoring Colby Turner from second off a hard line drive single to left field by Brayden Jefferis, bringing the score to 8-6.
The Wolverines added another insurance run in the eighth inning, after Turner hit a hard groundball through the infield to score Pace from second and extend the Michigan lead to 9-6.
In the top of the ninth, the Falcons were unable to score any runs, ending the game in nine innings with a final score of a 9-6 Michigan victory.
“If you sit here and talk about how many games you’ve got to win down the stretch, it takes away from the one you’ve got to win today,” said Hallock. “We’re at our best when we’re playing in the present tense. We had nine innings today with seven-ish solid innings against a good team. We need to do nine of them against our rival this weekend, three different times.”
Next, the Falcons will play in a three-game weekend series against rivals Toledo in the battle of I-75. The first game is set for April 24 at 6 p.m. at Stellar Field in Bowling Green, Ohio.
