Resurgence.
That’s what the Michigan baseball team showed on Saturday. The team had been slowing down offensively so far in the month of April, and the day’s starter, junior right-hander Cameron Weston, had been struggling relative to last year for most of the season.
But on Saturday, the Wolverines showed up on both sides of the ball, the offense reminding everyone what it’s capable of and Weston pitching his best game of the season.
“We just stayed positive and stayed with it and the game came back around.” Michigan coach Erik Bakich said.
On Saturday, Michigan (16-14 overall) took on Cal State Fullerton (10-18) in game two of their weekend series. The Wolverines won the game 8-2 to follow up their 2-1 victory in game one.
Last weekend against Iowa, Cameron Weston had a start that was below his usual standards. But Saturday, he came back swinging, or rather his opponents did, and the Titans kept missing.
Weston notched six strikeouts and allowed only one walk in his six inning outing.
While he did get into a few jams, giving up nine hits, more often than not he kept his cool and pitched his way out, giving up just two runs.
The defense supported Weston all game, and the Wolverine offense surged as well. After a relatively quiet start to the month, not scoring more than three runs through the first five games of April, they managed to put up eight runs.
This offense came off of solid base running and taking advantage of the CSF’s mistakes.
“The past couple weeks we’ve really been working hard on getting our jumps to second base,” junior right fielder Clark Elliott said. “We’re gonna take our walks and we’re gonna make things happen.”
Elliott would do his part, getting on base all five times he went to the plate.
In the first inning, graduate center fielder Joe Stewart made his way to third thanks to a balk and a wild pitch, which allowed him to score the first run of the day on a sacrifice fly from junior second baseman Ted Burton.
In the bottom of the third inning, Michigan worked two walks and a failed double play which resulted in both men reaching into an RBI hit-by-pitch, RBI single and a sacrifice fly.
Throughout the day, the Wolverines accumulated seven walks and two hit-by-pitches, and they capitalized repeatedly.
The offense continued to perform all game, also scoring a couple of runs in the fourth and sixth innings.
“We had contributions from a lot of people up and down the lineup,” Bakich said. “We ran the bases well, we got into scoring position.”
Aftering putting up his best start of the season, Weston was replaced in the top of the seventh inning by fellow junior right-hander Noah Rennard.
And he was almost untouchable.
Rennard cruised through the remainder of the game, pitching three scoreless innings and allowing just one base runner. Seven of his nine outs were strikeouts.
“Noah did a really good job,” Bakich said. “(It was) a relentless attack on the strike zone.”