Huskers Head to Baylor

Nebraska (30-7-1, 13-4-1 Big 12) at
Baylor (24-18, 8-10 Big 12)

Media Info
Live Radio: Husker Sports Network and for free on the Internet at Huskers.com  
Live Stats: Huskers.com                                 
Television: Saturday’s game will be televised by by Fox College Sports (Ch. 302 on Time Warner Cable and Ch. 669 on DirecTV)
Live Video: Baylorbears.com (No HuskersNside Video this weekend)

Probable Starting Pitchers
Friday
NU-Johnny Dorn, Sr., RHP (5-1, 2.60 ERA)  
BU-Kendal Volz, So., RHP (3-4, 4.31 ERA)

Saturday  
NU-Thad Weber, Sr., RHP (7-2, 4.23 ERA)
BU-Shawn Tolleson, R-Fr, RHP (4-2, 4.25 ERA)

Sunday 
NU-Aaron Pribanic, Jr., RHP (3-2, 3.86 ERA)
BU-Willie Kempf, So., RHP (5-1, 3.75 ERA)

On Tap: Following two wins over Creighton, the Nebraska baseball team returns to action this weekend with an important Big 12 series at Baylor. The series at the Baylor Ballpark begins Friday at 6:30 p.m. and continues on Saturday (6:30 p.m.) and Sunday (1 p.m.).

On the Radio and Internet: Fans across Nebraska can listen to Greg Sharpe and Lane Grindle call the action on the Husker Sports Network, including KLIN 1400 in Lincoln, KFAB 1110 AM in Omaha and KRVN 880 AM in Lexington and on the Internet at Huskers.com. HuskersNside will not carry this weekend’s games on video streaming.

The Huskers (30-7-1, 13-4-1 Big 12) have won six of their last seven games and come off their best offensive night of the season, putting up 16 runs on 18 hits in a 16-7 win over Creighton on Wednesday night in front of a crowd of 9,044 at Omaha’s Rosenblatt Stadium. The Huskers broke the game open with a 13-run fifth inning, the most runs the Huskers have scored in a frame since the 1999 season. DJ Belfonte led the charge with three RBIs and scored three times, while Craig Corriston and Jake Opitz had three hits apiece.

The Huskers will need to continue the offensive production this weekend, as they look for their first-ever series win in Waco. Nebraska enters the weekend 1.5 games behind Texas A&M in the Big 12 race with Oklahoma State and Missouri rounding out the top four spots.

The Bears (24-18, 8-10) were swept by Texas A&M over the weekend, as the Aggies scored six runs in the ninth to tie the game before winning in the 11th. The Bears snapped their five-game losing streak in emphatic fashion on Wednesday, routing Texas State, 25-13. Every starter had at least two hits, while Aaron Miller had five RBIs, as the Bears’ total was their highest ever in a road game.

3 Things to Watch
1.      Nebraska’s 10 doubles against Creighton on Wednesday set a school record and were two shy of the Big 12 record set by Texas Tech in 1998
2.      Jake Mort is hitting .333 over the last six games, raising his average to .248 on the year
3.      Family bragging rights will be on the line this weekend, as NU volunteer assistant coach Nate Thompson squares off with his brother, Baylor assistant coach Mitch Thompson.

Leading Off
?-The Huskers are an impressive 22-2-1 at Hawks Field this season, the fifth time in seven seasons that Nebraska has won at least 20 home games in a year.
?-Nebraska’s 16 runs scored against Creighton are the most the Huskers have put on the Bluejays since scoring 19 on April 13, 1995.
?-With a 30-7-1 record entering this weekend’s action, the Huskers are enjoying one of their best seasons since the program began in 1889. In fact, only four teams in school history have put up better record through the first 38 games than the 2008 Huskers.
?-The Huskers’ .803 winning percentage is on pace for the highest winning percentage in school history. NU has won 75 percent of its games only seven times , including three times this decade.
?-Nebraska’s psuedo RPI is 14th nationally following the two-game sweep of Creighton this week. The Huskers are one of only two Big 12 teams in the top 16 nationally in RPI. As a league, the Big 12 is fourth among all conferences nationally in RPI.
?-One of the traits the Huskers have shown is the ability to win close games. NU is 10-2 in games won by one run (5-1) and two runs (5-1).
?-The Huskers rank second in the Big 12 with 13 saves, a total which already ranks sixth in school history. The Huskers have saved at least 10 games in each of the last eight seasons. Prior to 2001, NU had reached double figures in saves two times since 1961.
?-Nebraska’s 13-4-1 start after the first five weeks of conference action is one of the program’s best-ever Big 12 starts. It is the fourth time the Huskers have won 13 of their first 18 league contests.
?-The Huskers went a season-high 44.1 consecutive innings without an error from April 15 to April 23. NU has committed less than two errors in 13 of its last 15 contests.
?-Despite losing six pitchers selected in the 2007 Major League Baseball Draft and returning only five pitchers who threw at least an inning from last year’s staff, the Huskers lead the Big 12 and rank among the national leaders with a 3.53 ERA.
?-Husker starting pitchers have pitched at least five innings in 31 of the 38 starts this season and are a combined 21-5 on the year.
?-The Huskers have shown the knack for comebacks in 2008, overcoming deficits 14 times this spring, including a four-run deficit at No. 13 Texas on March 28. Nebraska has trailed in six of its last seven wins dating back to April 5. Under Mike Anderson, the Huskers have authored 92 come-from-behind wins.
?-NU is 16-0-1 this season when recording at least 10 hits and 24-0 when out-hitting an opponent.
?-Mitch Abeita’s grand slam against Kansas on Saturday was the first by a Husker since Jeff Tezak hit one against Missouri on March 25, 2007. Abeita’s homer also ended a drought of five straight games without a Husker round tripper dating back to the final game of the Texas Tech series.
?-NU has won 111 of its last 112 games when taking a lead into the ninth inning and is 111-0-1 in that stretch dating back to the 2005 season. NU is 206-3-1 (.983) when leading after eight innings under Mike Anderson.
?-Following the series win over Kansas, the Huskers have won nine of their last 11 Big 12 series dating back to the 2007 season.
?-Nebraska’s 30 wins this season have already equaled its entire regular-season total from last season.
?-Junior Dan Jennings has been nearly flawless over the last month, as he is 4-0 with four saves and a 0.52 ERA in 10 appearances since March 18. He has struck out 35 over 33.1 innings of work and has allowed only 10 singles in that stretch. He tossed 30.1 shutout innings, a mark that is second in school history.
?-Saturday’s attendance of 8,697 at Hawks Field was the largest home crowd in the Big 12 this season and ranked as the third-largest crowd since Hawks Field at Haymarket Park opened in 2002. 
?-The 1-0 loss at No. 21 Oklahoma State on April 12 marked the first time that Nebraska had lost a game 1-0 since March 11, 1995, against Baylor, and was the first-ever 1-0 game at Oklahoma State’s Allie P. Reynolds Stadium, which opened in 1981.
?-The 14-game win streak Nebraska put together earlier this season tied for the fourth-longest win streak in school history and the longest since a 15-game win streak in 2000.The streak fell two games shy of the Big 12 record of 16 set by Kansas State (2006) and Texas Tech (2002).
?-The Huskers have undergone a youth movement as 10 true or redshirt freshmen have seen time this season and seven of them (Ben Kline, Dan Johnston, Tyler Rank, David Stewart, Andy Cotton. Brett Sowers and Casey Hauptman) have made at least one start.
?-Four former Huskers are currently on Major League Rosters. The group includes Darin Erstad (Houston Astros), Dan Johnson (Tampa Bay Rays), Alex Gordon (Kansas City Royals) and Joba Chamberlain (New York Yankees). Twenty six Huskers have reached the Major Leagues, including Gordon and Chamberlain in 2007.
?-If it seemed like the Huskers won a lot in March, they did. NU’s .886 winning percentage represented the second-best month in school history, trailing only a perfect 22-0 month in March of 1983. Nebraska’s 19 wins in March tied for the ninth-most victories by a Husker team in an month in school history.
?-Craig Corriston’s walk-off homer against Oklahoma on March 21 was the first by a Husker since 2005. The Huskers have had five walk-off homers since 2000.

Scouting Baylor
Under Steve Smith (514-329-1 in 14 seasons), Baylor enters the weekend with a 24-18 record following a 25-13 victory over Texas State Wednesday night. The Bears, who had dropped five straight games before Wednesday’s win, are in fifth place in the Big 12 race after being swept by league-leader Texas A&M last week, but are 17-7 at the Baylor Ballpark.

Offensively, Adam Hornung leads a balanced Bear attack with a .327 average with five homers and 31 RBIs. Baylor has four hitters above the .300 mark while five players have driven in at least 30 runs, while Ben Booker paces the Bears with 35 RBIs. Aaron Miller ranks among the Big 12 leaders in both homers (nine) and doubles (16) whiel hitting .304 on the year.

On the mound, Baylor’s weekend rotation of Kendal Volz, Shawn Tolleson and Willie Kempf have been solid all year, as Kempf leads the Bears with a 5-1 mark while Tolleson is second in the Big 12 with two shutouts.

Series History: Baylor leads the all-time series, 28-20, after the Huskers took 2-of-3 from the Bears last season in Lincoln. The Huskers will look to snap an eight-game losing streak in Waco, as the Huskers are 1-12 all-time at Baylor since the formation of the Big 12 in 1997.

Last Time Out
No. 8 Nebraska used its biggest inning in nine years, as the Huskers erupted for a season-high 16 runs in a 16-7 victory over Creighton Wednesday night. Trailing 4-3, the Huskers sent 17 men to the plate en route to scoring 13 runs off of five Creighton pitchers, the most runs Nebraska has scored in an inning since also plating 13 against Chicago State on March 16, 1999.

The Huskers loaded the bases off Bluejay reliever Zak Moore on a Jake Opitz single and two walks before a costly error on Bluejay first baseman Darren Ruf opened the floodgates for the Huskers, as his wild throw on a fielder’s choice allowed a pair of runs to score. NU continued to capitalize against Creighton, getting two-run doubles from Ben Kline and Bryce Nimmo along with run-scoring doubles from Jake Mort and Craig Corriston, as Nebraska totaled half its school-record 10 doubles in the inning

Six Huskers had at least two hits on the night, as DJ Belfonte led Nebraska with three RBIs, while Craig Corriston, Nimmo and Cody Neer all totaled a pair of doubles in helping the Huskers take the season series against its in-state rivals. Michael Mariot earned the victory in relief of starter Erik Bird, as Mariot (2-0) allowed two runs over three innings.