Schreiber, Huskers roll instate rival Creighton 15-2
Behind the red-hot bat of Scott Schreiber, Nebraska rolled past instate rival Creighton in record-setting fashion to the tune of a 15-2 drubbing Tuesday night in Omaha.
Schreiber paved the way with yet another memorable showing at the plate, going 5-for-6 with two home runs, career-high five RBIs, a double and two runs scored.
The Huskers ended up with 22 total hits and smacked three homers on the night, marking the second-most ever by one team in a game in the history of TD Ameritrade Park.
The victory also gave NU a valuable non-conference victory to improve its season record to 34-18 heading into its final Big Ten series of the regular season series this weekend at home vs. Indiana.
"It's a good time of year to start swinging the bats up and down the lineup," head coach Darin Erstad said during his postgame radio show on the Husker Sports Network. "I really liked our approach on some mixed counts... Just an all-around very good performance. Now we've got to do it again on Thursday."
In front of a crowd of 8,843, Nebraska jumped all over Creighton starter Austin Stroschein in the bottom of the first, racking up three runs off four hits and getting its first five batters of the game on base.
Ryan Boldt got things going with a leadoff double, and Jake Placzek went to first after being plunked by a pitch. Jake Meyers then beat out a bunt down the third base line for an infield single, and Ben Miller capitalized with a two-run single.
Schreiber followed that up with an RBI single of his own to give the Huskers an early 3-0 lead after just one inning of play.
Creighton got on the board in the top of the third on a solo homer by Nicky Lopez that just cleared the 335 mark in the right field corner to cut the lead to 3-1.
Nebraska didn’t waste any time getting that run back, though, as Schreiber blasted a solo shot of his own over the wall in left-center to push the lead back up to 4-1 in the bottom of the third. Jesse Wilkening followed that up with a double down the left field line, which marked the end of the day for Stroschein after just 2.0 innings of work.
Stroschein ended up allowing four earned runs off seven hits on just 39 pitches for the night.
Reliever Connor Miller took over on the mound for the Bluejays, but the damage would continue by the Huskers. Steven Reveles reached on an error by Lopez, and Jake Schleppenbach drove in Wilkening from third with an RBI single past first base.
Schleppenbach stole second to put runners on second and third, and then Reveles made it 6-1 on an RBI groundout to short that scored Reveles.
Creighton looked ready to make a dent in the Huskers’ lead in the top of the fifth when Kevin Connolly hit a leadoff double and Lopez drove him in three batters later to make it 6-2. But with runners at the corners and only one out, Reagan Fowler grounded into a 4-6-3 double play to end the threat.
A throwing error by Reveles and a single by Ryan Fitzgerald wound up ending the night for NU starter Max Knutson with two outs in the top of the sixth, but Jeff Chestnut came in to end the threat.
Knutson (3-1) went 5.2 innings and allowed two runs off seven hits with three strikeouts and a walk on 90 pitches.
"His off-speed stuff wasn't quite as sharp, but he had good feel on his fastball and was attacking the zone," Erstad said of Knutson. "Creighton's a very good fastball hitting team, and they knew he was going to come at them with fastballs and they were getting their swings off. But he made a couple huge pitches, and another nice performance by Max."
Nebraska would pad its lead in the bottom half of the sixth when Meyers roped a deep single to left-center to score Boldt from second. Placzek and Meyers moved to third and second on a fielder’s choice ground out by Miller, and Schreiber came through once again with a three-run bomb to left to make it a commanding 10-2 advantage.
The blast was Schreiber’s 15th of the season and gave him his second two-home run game in a row (he also did it Sunday vs. Penn State). It also marked just the third time in the history of TD Ameritrade Park that a player has recorded two homers in a game.
Schreiber would go on to record his fifth hit of the game with a leadoff single in the bottom of the eighth, and Reveles drove him home on a single to right. Boldt, Placzek and Meyers followed that up with three more RBI singles in a row, and pinch hitter Mike Waldron made it four straight to increase the lead to 15-2.
Because the Huskers reeled off seven hits in the inning, Schreiber got a second at-bat in the eighth. His run of nine straight hits dating back to Sunday finally came to an end on a deep fly out to center that was caught at the warning track.
"He has a pretty good skill set," Erstad said of Schreiber. "He's seeing the ball pretty well right now. You just ride him. Just stay away and let him do his thing."
Along with Schreiber’s big night, Meyers went 4-for-6 with two RBI and two runs scored, while Boldt and Wilkening each had three hits and combined for two doubles and five runs scored.
"Guys are putting their work in," Erstad said. "Our guys are feeding off each other, and I think we really kind of had a renewing of the vows type of thing in getting back to doing what we were doing earlier in the year. I think as a group they've kind of committed to it, and you can see when they are doing what they're capable of doing, it can be fun to watch."
The Huskers will close out the regular season this weekend with a three-game series with Indiana at Haymarket Park, which opens on Thursday night at 6:35 p.m.