Michigan State University
Illinois
Spartan Baseball Splits Twinbill With Illinois
5/4/2002 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
May 4, 2002
EAST LANSING, Mich. - The Michigan State baseball team split a doubleheader with Illinois Saturday (May 4) afternoon at Kobs Field as the Spartans took game one, 3-2 while the Illini won game two, 8-4. The Spartans are now 29-13 overall and 11-10 in the conference while Illinois is 26-13 overall and 10-11 in the Big Ten.
With Illinois leading 1-0 in the bottom of the first inning, MSU fought back to take a 2-1 lead off a ground out by Bob Malek (Jr., Canton) and RBI-single by Chris McCuiston (Sr., Birmingham).
With the game tied at two in the second, and Illinois runners in scoring position, MSU starter Nick Bates (Sr., Blissfield) worked himself out of a jam to keep the Illini off the board in the second inning, retiring the final three batters to end the inning without any damage.
State regained the lead at 3-2 in the third when catcher Jim Duffy (Fr., Carleton) led off the inning with a solo home run over the left center field fence, which ultimately proved to be the difference.
Illinois threatened in the fourth, sixth and seventh innings, stranding a total of three runners without scoring. Bates tossed his seventh complete game of the season en route to picking up his ninth win (9-2). Josh Gold took the loss for the Illini, falling to 2-2.
In the second game of the day, Illinois took a 2-0 lead in the third inning off two crucial Spartan errors; both runs were unearned. They added two more unearned runs in the fourth, keyed by an Andy Schutzenhofer RBI-single.
Illinois starter Tim Gorski no-hit the Spartans through four and one-thirds innings before James Moreno (So., Holt) broke it up with a single to center field-starting a four-run Spartan rally. David Miller (So., Whitehall) knocked a bases-loaded single through the left side to cut the Illini lead in half, 4-2. Jared Koutnik (Sr., Milwaukee, Wis.) kept the rally alive by driving in Brett Wattles (Jr., Rochester) to make the score 4-3. MSU completed the rally when Charlie Braun (Jr., Grosse Pointe) singled in Miller to tie the game at four.
The Illini came back in the sixth, however, scoring three times off four hits to reclaim the lead, 7-4. They added another run in the seventh, making the final score 8-4.
Tim Day (Fr., West Chester, Ohio) started on the hill for the Spartans and gave up six runs, only two of which were earned, struck out two and suffered the loss to fall to 7-3. Dave Mazurek earned the win for Illinois to improve to 1-1.
The series concludes Sunday (May 5) with a single game beginning at 1 p.m.
Game 1Michigan State 3, Illinois 2WP- Bates (9-2)LP- Gold (2-2)Score By Innings R H EIllinois 110 000 0 2 4 0Michigan State 201 000 x 3 7 1
Game 2Michigan State 8, Illinois 4WP- Mazurek (1-1)LP- Day (7-3)Score By Innings R H EIllinois 002 203 1 8 10 0Michigan State 000 040 0 4 6 4
