Michigan baseball roundup: Wolverines walk off to sweep series with Cal State Fullerton
Michigan Wolverines baseball won a low-scoring game Friday, was great on the mound and at the plate in a Saturday triumph and came out on top in a Sunday thriller to sweep Cal State Fullerton.
Here’s a recap of how the weekend unfolded for Michigan, with highlights and commentary.
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Game 1: Michigan 2, Cal State Fullerton 1 (Friday)
It was a pitchers’ duel Friday at Ray Fisher Stadium, with neither team scoring until Michigan center fielder Joe Stewart crossed the plate in the bottom of the sixth inning via an RBI single from second baseman Ted Burton.
Cal State Fullerton scored one to tie it at 1-1 in the top of the eighth frame, but Michigan answered with a solo home run by third baseman Matt Frey on the first pitch of the bottom of the inning. That served as the game-winning run in the Wolverines’ series-opening victory, with sophomore right-hander Chase Allen stranding the bases loaded in the ninth to close things out. The bases were also juiced in the eighth, but Michigan yielded just the one run.
Left-handed sophomore Connor O’Hallahorn had a stellar start, going 7.1 innings and giving up just seven hits and one earned run. The Wolverines have now won four of his last five starts, including two straight.
Game 2: Michigan 8, Cal State Fullerton 2 (Saturday)
Led by right fielder Clark Elliott — who reached base in all five plate appearances with two hits and three walks — Michigan’s bats heated up Saturday. Elliott and Stewart, the first and second batters in the Michigan order, respectively, combined to score six runs. The Wolverines’ pitching staff combined for 13 strikeouts in the dominant victory.
Michigan was up 6-2 in the top of the sixth inning, before Cal State Fullerton had its best opportunity of the game. The Titans loaded the bases on a trio of singles, but Weston came up with an inning-ending double play to shortstop on a nice play from senior Riley Bertram.
The Wolverines poured it on in the bottom half of the frame, with two runs on RBI singles — one by Stewart and the other from Frey — that served as insurance.
Michigan had just eight hits to Fullerton’s 10, but Weston and right-handed reliever Noah Rennard were stingy with runners on the bases. Weston is now 2-2 on the season.
Game 3: Michigan 11, Cal State Fullerton 10 (Sunday)
Sunday’s game was filled with drama, and it ended in walk-off fashion, with Michigan shortstop Alex Fedje-Johnson scoring on a wild pitch. There were five lead changes in the Wolverines’ exciting win.
Michigan actually fell behind 5-1 in the fourth inning, before Bertram notched an RBI double and left fielder Jordon Rogers walked with the bases loaded to score DH Tito Flores.
That made it 5-3, but Fullerton actually extended its lead with a run in each of the fifth and sixth frames.
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Then came the sixth-inning fireworks for Michigan.
A scoring error scored Rogers and Frey, and Burton had an RBI single to left field to pull the Maize and Blue within one run, 7-6. Flores hit a three-run bomb to left center that put the Wolverines ahead and in the driver’s seat, 9-7.
But Fullerton rallied with two runs in the eighth inning, with reliever Angelo Smith, Michigan’s fourth pitcher of the day, yielding three earned runs in just 0.2 innings of work.
Rennard came in and had a nice outing for the second straight day. He pitched the final 1.1 innings and gave up just two hits and no runs. Fullerton’s erratic pitching finally did it in, with Stewart scoring on a wild pitch in the eighth and Fedje-Johnson crossing the plate on a wild pitch in the ninth, making it an 11-10 walk-off win.
What It Means, And What’s Next
Michigan is back on track. The Wolverines had lost four of five entering the weekend, including two mid-week games to Oakland and Purdue Fort Wayne. Cal State Fullerton is 9-19 on the year — not exactly a worldbeater — but this was a nice series for the Maize and Blue to potentially find a groove.
The pitching staff has struggled at times and been inconsistent this season, but it yielded just three runs in the first two games of the series. O’Hallahorn has given up one or fewer runs in three of his last four starts and is becoming a really solid Friday starter.
Michigan’s bats have been good, not great, with a .261 average that ranked 10th in the Big Ten entering Sunday. They’ll need to be opportune in Wednesday’s contest at Notre Dame, and the pitching staff — which holds a combined 5.53 ERA — will have to step up. The Irish entered the weekend with the best fielding percentage in the country (.989) and ranking seventh in WHIP (1.18) and seventh in strikeouts per nine innings (11.5). They slot 13th in the D1Baseball.com top 25 rankings.
The Wolverines will travel east to Michigan State for a three-game weekend series. The Spartans are 13-14 on the year and recently went on a five-game losing streak.
