Senior Matt Gardner was ready to pitch against Nebraska this past weekend after beating Western Illinois on Tuesday, but both Cowboy starters Friday and Saturday pitched complete games.
After solid pitching led the Cowboys to a series victory against Nebraska, coach Frank Anderson said he knew the final game would be interesting.
Friday’s opener was a hard-fought 1-0 win for OSU (23-10, 8-7 Big 12). Sophomore Andrew Oliver pitched a complete game, striking out 10, walking none and giving up three hits.
On Saturday, the Cowboys’ offense produced 19 runs while sophomore Tyler Lyons pitched his second straight complete game, giving up two runs on six hits.
Anderson said he was nervous about playing Sunday because he wasn’t sure how his team would play after its impressive victory.
“I hate the day after a blowout, especially if it’s the last day and you’ve already won the series,” Anderson said. “There’s always a situation where you worry about how you’re going to react emotionally.”
Anderson’s fears were realized as the Cowboys found themselves on the other side of a blowout, losing the series finale 14-5.
Although five pitchers combined to give up 14 runs, Anderson said the Cowboys lost as a team.
“The people that are on the mound dictate so much what goes on, and when things go sideways you have to score a lot of runs,” Anderson said. “We lost as a group; it wasn’t the pitching staff or the defense, it was the entire [team]. When you give up runs, then you need to match run for run, and we didn’t do that.”
Senior Robbie Weinhardt pitched 2 1/3 innings and gave up three runs on five hits. He said the pitching staff deserved most of the blame.
“As a pitching staff as a whole, we walked too many people today,” Weinhardt said. “We didn’t give our hitters a chance.
“Their pitchers did well today. They threw strikes, and they got ahead of us.”
The Cowboys took a 2-1 lead in the bottom of the second, but Nebraska (25-6-1, 11-3-1) answered with four runs in the top of the third.
OSU’s only rally came in the fifth when Nebraska led 8-2. The Cowboys trimmed the lead to 8-5, but that was as close as they would get.
“They pitched better than us, that’s all you can really say,” Weinhardt said. “Pitching is part of the game. We hit the ball [Saturday], but our pitching kept us in the game Friday and Saturday. [Sunday] our pitching didn’t keep us in the game.”
Weinhardt said when the pitchers have an off-game, it affects everyone else on the team. The Cowboys had two errors resulting in two unearned runs.
“We kinda let our position players sit back on their heels,” Weinhardt said. “The intensity is not what it was Friday and Saturday.”
Weinhardt said the lack of intensity is what bothered him the most about the Cowboys’ performance.
“We have to do better than that, especially going for the sweep,” he said. “I thought that we should have been more excited and more ready to play.”
OSU will travel to UT-Arlington on Tuesday and then face Mid-America Christian University at home on Wednesday at 6:30 p.m.
After Wednesday’s game, the Cowboys won’t play at home again until April 25, and even though Sunday’s game ended in disappointment, Anderson said it was good to play at home before the long road trip.
“We’ve been on the road; it’s not like we’re going on the road for the first time,” Anderson said. “But it was nice to come home for a while.”
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