• Marlon Lucky and Joe Ganz appear on award watch lists
• Eshaunte Jones appears to be headed to Nebraska
• Want to play NCAA Football 2008 with Grant Wistrom?
• Will Khiry Cooper stay in Lincoln or sign with the Los Angeles Angels?
• Hunter Teafatiller gets third DUI in the last year
• Walter Roese has joined the Nebraska mens basketball staff
• Huskers host regionals this weekend
• What former Husker Trev Alberts thinks about the 2008 team
• Husker hoops recruit Roburt Sallie won’t be making it to Lincoln
• Dorn and Herr save the day
• Huskers Drop 4th Straight to Bears
• Big inning sinks #5 Huskers
• Huskers get commitment #5 as Dontrayevous Robinson pledges
• C.J. Zimmerer gets Nebraska offer and quickly accepts
• Huskers sweep doubleheader with dramatic comebacks

Lincoln, NE - The Huskers (36-8-1, 15-5-1) took two games from Louisiana-Lafayette winning 4-3 in both games.  The wins mark the 4th consecutive victory for the Huskers and is the 250th victory for Head Coach Mike Anderson. 

Game 1 - The first game was a continuation of a unfortunate pattern, Johnny Dorn pitches a great game yet doesn’t walk away with a victory.  Johnny pitched for 7.2 innings, scattered 5 hits, struck out 11 and gave up 3 earned runs.   However, when he left the game, the scored was knotted at 3. 

Dorn ran into a little trouble with 2 outs in the 7th when Zach Herr came in and struckout the last batter to end the inning.  In the bottom of the frame, Cody Neer knocked in the go ahead run to put Herr in position to earn the win.  Herr came out for the ninth and after a leadoff popout, he struck out the final two batters to seal the win.  With the win, Herr moved to 3-0 on the year.

Cody Neer powered the Husker offense in game one with a 2 for 4 day and 2 RBIs.  Ben Kline, Mitch Abeita, and Nick Sullivan also added 2 hits apiece to help lead the charge.

Game 2 - The nightcap was a 14 inning thriller that ended with Mitch Abeita hitting an RBI grounder up the middle to score Jake Mort from 2nd in walk-off fashion in the bottom of the 14th.

The MVP of the game might be Mike Nesseth though.  Mike came in to relieve Dan Jennings in the 9th and threw 3 innings, not allowing a single hit and striking out 6.  He helped keep the Rajin Cajuns at bay until the Huskers could put up a run and walk away with a victory.  Erik Bird came in to relieve Nesseth and pitched two scoreless innings to earn his 3rd win.

Aaron Pribanic got the start ahead of Thad Weber who couldn’t be with the team so he could be present for the birth of his first child.  Pribanic went 6 innings and gave up just 2 earned runs in a nice bounce back from a few rough starts in recent weeks.

Dan Johnston, Jake Opitz, Mitch Abeita and Bryce Nimmo all chipped in 2 hits apiece.   Mort drew a leadoff walk in the bottom of the 14th and stole 2nd before Abeita drilled the ball up the middle to score Mort for the game winner. 

The Huskers used a dramatic 2-run 9th inning to tie it and send it into extra innings.  They scored both runs with 2 outs, including the 2nd on an error by the 3rd baseman to tie it up.

The Huskers take the week off for finals week before Texas A&M Aggies come to town in what is turning out to be the showdown for the Big XII title.  The Aggies enter the series having won 15 straight Big XII games, a league record.  They lead the league in about every offensive category and are just behind the Huskers in pitching.  It will be the 2nd time this year that Haymarket has played host to two Top 10 nationally ranked teams.  The first time was when Nebraska played Wichita State, who was then #5 in the country.

The Aggies are ranked as high as #6 (and as low as #10) coming into this week.  The first pitch is set for 6:35 pm on Friday night with Johnny Dorn getting the start.  Hopefully, we can see Johnny pitch well AND pickup a win in one game.

Lincoln, NE - The Huskers (34-8-1, 15-5-1) took both games of a midweek series with the Western Illinois Leathernecks 6-4 and 6-1.  The first win gave the Huskers 1 more win than last year’s season mark of 32, with 10 regular season games, a Big XII tourney and NCAA tourney left, the Huskers look set to win 40 games for the 3rd time in the last 4 seasons.

In the 1st game, the young guys really stepped up in a big way.  Freshman shortstop Ben Kline from Omaha Central hit a bases-loaded single in the 6th to give the Huskers the lead they would not relent.  Freshman pitcher Casey Hauptman from Millard South pitched a career high 4 innings and gave up just 2 hits to get his first career win.  Freshman reliever Mike Nesseth pitched a perfect 9th inning for his 4th save of the year.

In the 2nd game, Husker pitcher Erik Bird got the start and pitched 5 scoreless innings to notch his 4th win of the year.  Freshman 1st baseman Tyler Farst got things going for the offense in the 3rd when he drilled a 2-RBI double off the base of the wall with the bases loaded and just 1 out. After DJ Belfonte was hit by a pitch, Nick Sullivan was hit by a pitch to score another run.

Weekend starter Aaron Pribanic came in for 2 innings of perfect relief, perhaps a sign that Mike Anderson might be considering using lefty Dan Jennings for the Sunday start this weekend since Pribanic has struggled as of late.

The Huskers take on Louisiana-Lafayette for a three game series this weekend starting Friday at 6:35 followed up by a double-header on Saturday at 12:05pm and 6:35pm.

Lincoln, NE - The Huskers (29-7-1, 13-4-1) couldn’t get much going against Creighton starter Greg Hellhake.  They managed just 4 hits and 0 runs in his 5 innings.  When Creighton went to the bullpen in the 6th, the Huskers took advantage and scored all their runs in a 4-3 victory in that frame.

Jake Mort opened the frame with a base hit up the middle and moved up to 2nd on a wild pitch.  Two batters later, Senior Catcher Mitch Abeita singled to left, scoring Mort to tie up the game at 1 apiece.  Even though Nick Sullivan popped out on the next play, the Huskers weren’t done.  After and Abeita steal, Creighton intentionally walked Craig Corriston to setup the force out.   Unfortunately, Creighton’s Jeremy Hauer couldn’t find his control, walking DJ Belfonte. 

Creighton brought in T.J. Roemmich who plunked Freshman left fielder Dan Johnston to give the Huskers their first and final lead.  After another pitching change, freshman Ben Kline singled home Belfonte and Corriston to extend the lead to 4-1.

It was a good thing for the Huskers too, because the next inning, Junior Nick Nordgren parked a 1-0 Erik Anderson pitch in the left-center berms to trim the lead to one.

On the mound, the Huskers got yet another excellent outing from Junior Dan Jennings.  Although his 30-inning scoreless streak ended in the 4th, he pitched 6 solid innings, walked 1, and gave up just 3 hits while striking out 5.  Zach Herr and Mike Nesseth combined to closeout the game with Nesseth earning his 4th save of the year.

The Huskers and Bluejays both make the 50-mile trek up I-80 for tomorrow night’s game as the two teams make up for the weather postponed contest on April 1st.  First pitch is set for 6:35pm and the Huskers send Erik Bird to the mound, fresh off his brilliant performance against top 10 Wichita State Shockers last week.

Lincoln, NE - Senior catcher Mitch Abeita hit one home run all last year.  Today Abeita hit his 7th home run of the year, a grand slam in the 4th inning that gave the Huskers (28-6-1, 13-3-1) a 4-2 lead.  The 8-6 win over the Jayhawks gave Nebraska the series win, their 5th Big XII series win out of 6 tries.

Senior Thad Weber picked up his 7th win of the year (7-2), although it was not his best outing of the year, giving up 4 runs over 5 innings and struck out 7.  Zach Herr picked up his 3rd save of the year with a solid 1.2 innings of scoreless work to finally shut down the Jayhawks. 

8,697 fans watched as the Huskers loaded the bases with just one single by Bryce Nimmo, a misplayed bunt from Jake Mort and a walk to Jake Opitz.  Then Abeita drilled the 2-1 pitch over the left field wall for the grand slam and the 4-2 lead.

The Jayhawks would tie it again in the next inning, but the Huskers would grab the lead right back.  Ben Kline opened the inning with a single. On a brilliant call bike Coach Anderson, Kline took off on the pitch while Nimmo faked the bunt and leaned across the plate and slapped a ground ball right back where the shortstop covering 2nd orginally was.  Ben Kline hustled around 2nd and just beat the throw to third while Nimmo smartly took 2nd when he saw the throw was to third.  Two batters later, Opitz would ground out to the 1st baseball and score Kline from third, giving the Huskers back the lead for good.

In the next inning, the Huskers would add a couple more.  Corriston was hit by the pitch to open the frame and then brought home on a DJ Belfonte double to right center.  DJ would eventually come around to score on a Bryce Nimmo single to 2nd base where he just beat out the throw to give the Huskers a 7-4 advantage.

The Jayhawks would pull back within 1 off of a double in the 7th and a solo home run in the 8th that would chase reliver Mike Nesseth to bring the score to 7-6.  But the Huskers would add an insurance run in the 8th when Jake Opitz hit an infield single just past a running 3rd baseman and score Kline who doubled 3 batters earlier.

Zach Herr walked the leadoff batter in the 9th, but put the next three down in order to earn the save and the Husker victory.

The win kept the Huskers just a half game out of first place in the Big XII behind Texas A&M who beat Baylor 11-1 on Saturday.  The Huskers will go for the sweep tomorrow at Hawks Field at 1:05 pm.  The game will be televised on NET sports across the state of Nebraska.

Lincoln, NE - Northern Colorado Head Coach Kevin Smallcomb is probably glad to be done playing the Huskers (19-3-1, 5-0-1) for the rest of 2008.  His team has played Nebraska 6 times this season and lost all 6 for a combined 53-15.  Today, Erik Bird kept the Bears pretty quiet for 5 innings, giving up just 4 hits, 2 runs (1 unearned) and struck out 3.

Like yesterday, the offense used a huge 3rd inning to blow the game wide open.  Coming into the frame, the game was knotted at 2.  When the inning was finally over, the Husker had built up a 7-2 lead and with Bird on the mound, they were cruising.

9 different Huskers had hits today, but most notable may have been Freshman Ben Kline.  Ben has been in a rather large slump since the beginning of the Big XII season and his average that was once above .300 has plumetted all the way down to .224.

After Bird, Casey Houptman and Erik Anderson each threw 2 innings apiece to preserve the 9-4 victory.

Next up for the Huskers is a trip to Austin, TX for a battle against fellow ranked Big XII school Texas at Disch Falk field.  The game was originally slated for a night start, but due to the scheduling of Texas’s basketball team’s NCAA tournament game, the baseball game has been moved to 3:00pm.

Lincoln, NE - The young season is barely over 2 weeks old and already there doesn’t seem to be enough to say about Senior right-handed pitcher Johnny Dorn.   Dorn led the Huskers (7-2) to a clear 12-2 victory over Northern Colorado (5-5) with an impressive career-high 13 strikeouts in 7 innings including striking out the first 7 batters.  Even though the Bears managed to scratch two runs off of him (1 unearned), Dorn was really in control all day.  The Bears managed just 3 hits off the Senior, none before the 5th inning.

For the offense, the Huskers used 2 big innings to put the game away early.   In the five-run 2nd inning, Bryce Nimmo, Cody Neer, Nick Sullivan, Ben Kline, DJ Belfonte and Jake Mort rattled off 6 consecutive base hits to give Johnny more than enough runs to put the game at 4-0.  Opitz added a sacrifice fly to cap the scoring at 5. 

On the day, Senior Bryce Nimmo led the way with a 3 for 4, 2 RBI, 2 Run day.  Freshman Ben Kline also added a 2 for 3 day with an RBI and 2 runs scored to increase his average to .310 for the season. 

But the real story of the day was on the mound.  Dorn has always been a solid pitcher for Nebraska and is 2nd on the career win (33) list behind Shane Komine (41) so it should be no suprise that Johnny’s pitching well, but never in his career has he been this dominant.  

Consider these numbers:

• 13.05 Ks/9 this year vs 6.87 a year ago  (71 all last year in 16 starts vs 29 in 3 this year)
• 5.23 ERA vs a miniscule 1.35 this year
• .149 Opponents Batting Average this year vs .270 Last Year

It’s way to early to draw any real conclusions, but what we’ve seen so far has made it tough to contain the excitement.  It should be exciting to watch as the young Huskers have showed a lot of promise early on.

On Sunday the two teams match up again at 12:05 pm for a double header.  The first game features Junior Dan Jennings (1-0, 2.79 ERA) vs former Nebraska pitcher Jon Klausing.  Klausing has impressed thus far for the Bears with a 1-0 record and a 1.50 ERA.

The two teams wrap up the series with a Monday afternoon game at 1:35 pm.  The series was pushed back 1 day in hopes to catch warmer temperatures for the game.

Lincoln, NE - You would think that a guy who’s 2nd on the alltime career win list going into his senior year with a program like NU would already be pretty decent, but what we’ve seen out of the Senior right hander so far this year is something even better.  Although he didn’t factor in the decision, his 7 inning 9 strikeout performance kept Riverside at bay while the Husker offense scraped together enough runs to win a 3-2 prototypical Friday pitcher’s deul over UC-Riverside.

Dorn’s only mistake today (of the season really) was in the second inning when he surrendered a two run blast to UC Riverside’s Ben Price that gave the Highlander’s the early 2-0 lead.

For Johnny, the first three years of his career would best be described as consitent, but not overpowering stuff.  This year we’re seeing something different.  He’s much more agressive, getting ahead of batters in early counts and mixing up his pitches in a way that is baffling batters.   He’s only allowed 2 earned runs in 13 innings work for a measly 1.38 ERA while striking out 16.  The 11 strikeouts per 9 innings he’s averaging this year far better than the 6.9 we saw last year.  The Huskers will certainly need him to step up and be the leader on this young pitching staff this year.

The Huskers used Mitch Abeita and Jeff Tezak solo home runs to even the score at 2 in the 2nd and 4th inning respectively off starter Stephen Penney.

With the score still knotted at 2, the Huskers appeared to be in serious trouble in the top of the 8th when back to back leadoff walks and a fielders choice infield single loaded the bases with no outs.  Junior Zach Herr and juco sophomore Erik Anderson struck out three consecutive batters to end the threat.

The very next inning, Ben Kline led off with a double down the line in left and came around to score on a wild pitch for the go ahead run.  The freshman from Omaha Central made some spectacular defensive stops in Palo Alto last week and this week he comes through with the bat.

Erik Anderson allowed a leadoff single in the 9th and a groundout moved the runner to 2nd, but struck out the final two hitters to end the game.

The defensive play of the game came in the Top of the 5th when DJ Belfonte dove in foul territory to end the inning and slid into the temporary fences put up around a swamp like area on the field.

The two teams face off in a double header on Saturday with the first pitch scheduled for 12:05pm.  The second game is slated to follow 30 minutes after the conclusion of the first.