It was a long day at the Haymarket Park for the Big Red Saturday afternoon, as the Maryland Terrapins dominated NU to a tune of 11-2.
Nebraska drops to 24-12 on the year and 7-4 in Big Ten play.
Maryland got to start Mason McConaughey early in this contest. Despite the freshman’s excellent start to the year, with a 2.29 ERA in 35.1 innings, he served pitches to Terrapin hitters on a silver platter, relinquishing 5 runs in 1.2 innings pitched.
Caleb Clark came in relief for McCoungahey in the second inning. Clark started his day out nicely. Through three innings, he held Maryland at bay, giving up one run and keeping Nebraska in the contest. Unfortunately for Clark, his offense provided him no help.
Maryland cracked the game wide open in 6th. The Terrapins scored 3 runs on Clark, knocking him out of the game, and added two more runs off reliever Bobby Olsen for good measure. Maryland scored 5 runs on two homers, making the score 11-1
Maryland rode their pitching the rest of the way, leaving Haymarket Park with an 11-2 victory.
Nebraska’s pitching was not good enough to win on Saturday, but their offense left much to be desired. The Big Red offense was nowhere to be found, hitting an abysmal 2-for-17 with runners on base, and left nine runners stranded. Maryland’s Omar Melendez was lights out. The lefty allowed two runs off six hits in six innings of work. The Junior bounced back from his last outing, allowing four runs in 2.2 innings pitched against the Northwestern Wildcats and kept the Big Red on their toes all day.
The only Husker who could figure out Melendez was the fiery Ben Columbus. Columbus, NU’s leader on average, extended his hitting streak to six games with homerun in the fourth. Columbus drove in Nebraska’s second run of the game in the 6th on a sacrifice fly, scoring Josh Caron. Columbus is 12 of his last 22 from the batter’s box and has four home runs in his last six games.
Nebraska and Maryland will face off tomorrow, Sunday, April 21, in a 12:05 p.m. rubber match at Haymarket Park.