• Missouri clobbers the Huskers 52-17
• Penalties and mental mistakes doom the Huskers
• Huskers and Hokies are ready to face off
• Former Husker Thunder Collins arrested for murder?
• Nebsports.Com is back online!
• Nebraska - Virginia Tech game to be shown on ABC
• Huskers have no problems with New Mexico State
• Nebraska lines up future games with Miami and Fresno State
• Huskers are ready for New Mexico State
• Andy Christensen re-instated by Coach Pelini
• Vote for Cornhusker cheerleader Katie Rockwell
• Huskers stuggled against San Jose State but win 35-12
• Huskers are ready for San Jose State
• Nebraska Football Tickets available
• Andy Christensen found not guilty

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.

Due to inclimate weather postponing the remainder of the 3rd game, the Husker’s 4th and final game of the series was cancelled.  Despite an inspired performance from starter Dan Jennings, the Huskers came up short losing 4-2 to the Stanford Cardinal. 

Jennings picked up right where he left off on Saturday and held the Cardinal hitters scoreless for the 3rd and 4th innings. From there Junior College transfer Aaron Pribanic took the Huskers deep into the seventh.  With 2 out, Pribanic walked Cord Phelps on a full count to keep the inning alive.  In came reliever Erik Bird who gave up a line drive double to tie the game at 1. 

Herr replaced Bird and the wheels came off.  Herr got what appeared to be an inning ending ground ball to Senior 2nd baseman Jake Opitz, but his throw sailed wide.  Herr made a great play on the ball backing up first base and had the runner rounding 3rd dead in his sights.  However, after a long weekend of pouring rain, the ball slipped from his hands and sailed allowing the go ahead run to score.

The Husker’s woes continued in the 7th when the next batter hit a two run smash to give the Cardinal a 4-1 lead.

The boys tried to take back the lead when Jeff Tezak doubled home Opitz in the 8th to notch the game at 4-2.  Florida Transfer Cody Neer drew the walk to put runners on 1st and 2nd, but Jeff Abeita struck out to end the threat.

Despite losing the series 2-1, the weekend wasn’t a total loss for the Huskers.  We saw a great effort by a young team that could suprise some people this year.  They played hard, they never gave up or got down.  Even with Stanford commading a 17-0 lead, the Huskers fought and scratched to get 7 of those runs back and then proceeded to pour it on for the 2nd game win.   The last game was a gritty battle where the deciding factor was some moisture on the ball from the pouring rains that drenched the field. 

Dan Jennings performance today was definitely worth noting.  Combined with the home stretch from last season, Dan’s been on a roll and really controlling the game.  I really expect him to emerge as the #2 guy in this rotation behind Dorn.  JC transfer Pribanic also looked very sharp, but lacked a little of the control that we saw from Jennings.  Nesseth has looked sharp as well and should be a valuable commodity out of the bullpen.

The biggest issues we had this weekend could very easily be chalked up to early season jitters.  Espeically since the weather never really permitted the team to practice outdoors.  The team had too many errors (8), but again a lot of that can be chalked up to not having enough time on a real field.  The hitting and baserunning was agressive for a change.  The players seemed to have more of a winning attitude and much more team oriented.  This is a very distant observation of the few times I saw the team this weekend, so we’ll wait and see more as the season goes on.  However, if we see more efforts out of this team that we saw this weekend, this Husker fan will be very satisfied, regardless of wins and losses.

Three Nebraska Baseball players have been suspended for their role in trying to return bats to Scheels for cash.  These bats were given to the team to use during last season and once the season was over, they choose to take some of them and try to “return” them to Scheels and get cash.

Andy Gerch will be sitting out the first 12 games next year.  Right now it is uncertain if Gerch will even play baseball as he recovers from major surgery on his shoulder during the off season.

Craig Corriston who was also involved in the incident has been suspended for the first six games as well.

Catcher Jeff Lanning, also got hit with a six-game penalty, but he’s transferred to the University of New Orleans and will serve the penalty there I would assume.

Jeff Tezak will not miss any games because he received less than $100 in the fiasco.

All of the suspensions and games were based on how much money the players received.  Jeeze, I wonder what Gerch all tried to sell lol.  C’mon boys are you strapped that hard for cash?