Nebraska's arms flip script in bounce-back victory

After Friday's 17-5 debacle that saw Nebraska walk 17 Wichita State batters, Darin Erstad declared, "This game has zero bearing on tomorrow."

His words turned out to be quite prophetic.

For a staff that couldn't throw the ball in the general vicinity of the plate one day earlier, Nebraska's pitchers found new life in the second game of the series. The Huskers walked just five and shut out Wichita State 4-0 to improve to 10-7 on the season.

So what was the difference between Friday's implosion and Saturday's strong performance?

"They threw it over that white thing (home plate), plain and simple," Erstad said. "We had one, maybe two noncompetitive walks. It was just a better job of throwing strikes. And when you throw strikes, good things happen."

The pitchers were far from perfect. The Shockers still had 11 base runners, but Nebraska managed to strand them all. Making his first career weekend start, Jake McSteen put men on in all five of his frames, including three with two base runners. But the redshirt freshman kept each of them from reaching home, a gutty performance that epitomized the Huskers' effort Saturday.

"That's been my goal since I started pitching when I 12. You always want to throw strikes and get ahead in the count, "McSteen said. "As coach Erstad says, if we're going to get beat they're going to hit us. My goal was to throw strikes and let my defense work. That was my plan from the start."

Reece Eddins allowed only two base runners over the next three innings to earn the win and Chad Luensmann shut the door with a strong ninth.

The game remained scoreless into the sixth inning as Shockers starter Zach Lewis had the Huskers handcuffed. But then Ryan Boldt worked a one-out single, Jake Placzek walked and Ben Miller, Scott Schreiber and Jesse Wilkening all knocked RBI singles to break the game open.

The Huskers added one more run in the seventh when Steven Reveles led off with a double and eventually scored on a sacrifice fly by Placzek.

But the game's headline was NU's pitching. Erstad said he didn't talk to McSteen or the others about avoiding another outing like Friday's. He wanted the players to turn the page, and that message was received.

"It doesn't matter," Erstad said. "It's the next day. You have to have that mentality in this game or it will drive you insane. If you're an emotional roller coaster and when you're doing good you're happy and when you're doing bad you're sad... you just can't do that. This game just doesn't work that way.

"I'm not going to be that way, and if I'm like that, my team is going to be like that."

Pitcher Reece Eddins: Through one month Eddins has arguably been one of Nebraska's most valuable players. He tossed three scoreless innings Saturday, lowering his ERA to 1.02. A starter in high school, Eddins' ability to come in and pitch multiple effective innings has been a godsend for the Huskers. Despite not yet starting a game, Eddins' 17.2 innings are the second-most on the team.

***Outfielder Jake Meyers, who is hitting .354 with 10 runs, sat out the game after being hit by a pitch on the hands Friday night.

***Wilkening threw out a runner attempting to steal in the fourth inning, his third caught stealing in just nine starts.

***The attendance was 1,507.