DEKALB – The NIU baseball team (10-25, 6-6 MAC) will head to Indiana for their first of four in the Hoosier State in a mid-week game against Indiana State (17-15, 4-2 MVC). This will start NIU's MAC bye week, as they will not play a Mid-American Conference game due to the odd number of teams.
Both teams will turn to freshmen lefties with small workloads to start the game on Tuesday afternoon as the Sycamores will throw Tyler Grauer and the Huskies will start
Eric Hammer. Grauer has pitched three and a third innings with four strikeouts and three walks to give up seven earned runs. Hammer has made six appearances, all being an inning or less totaling five and two-thirds innings with eight walks and five strikeouts to give up three runs, two earned.
The Huskies look to continue swinging the bats the way they did last weekend against Kent State, recording 31 hits in the three-game series. The NIU offense especially broke out in Sunday's walk-off win against the Golden Flashes, scoring eight runs on 14 hits.
Led by four-hit performances by
Jacob Dunham and
Luke Yapp, the Huskies were able to win in the ninth inning after giving up the lead three different times. The big hit came from
Samuel Vega, for his team-leading 15th multi-hit game of the season.
There was also a little more thump in the NIU bats from two players in particular on Sunday. Dunham and
Mike Roberson recorded all four of the Huskies' extra base hits as they each doubled and pounded solo home runs out of Ralph McKinzie Field to left.
Dunham still sits atop the Huskie batting charts with a .348 batting average in 27 games played, also leading the team in slugging percentage (.472) and on base percentage (.450). Vega is the only other NIU hitter above the .300 mark on the season with his .305 average, playing in all 35 of their NIU contests this season.
Coming on offensively as of late is junior left fielder
Joe Jumonville, who has reached base in 16-straight games with a current four-game hitting streak to hold a .291 average and a .392 on base percentage, good for second best on the team.
The Huskies have played Indiana State ten times as the two teams have split the all-time series at 5-5 with the last meeting coming in 2001.
The Sycamores are led offensively by three players hitting .299 or better with regular playing time in Dane Giesler, Tyler Friis and Tony Rosselli. Rosselli, an outfielder, leads the team in batting average at .378 with six doubles, five triples and four home runs.
Giesler and Friis are infielders that play a slightly different game than each other at the plate. Friis is hitting .299 with six extra base hits, 14 walks and six strikeouts. Giesler boasts a .319 average, leads the team in RBIs (27), home runs (8) and strikeouts (31).
After this mid-week matchup, NIU will play a three-game series against Evansville starting on Friday. HuskieBall fans can follow the team on Twitter @NIU_Baseball and on Instagram @niu_baseball.
