Everything Huskers baseball coach Will Bolt said ahead of team’s opening series

The Nebraska baseball season officially kick starts into high gear today with a morning first pitch (11 a.m. CT) against Baylor.

Opening day against the Bears is the first of a three-game showcase in Arlington, Texas against former Big 12 opponents. After Nebraska squares off with Baylor, it will face No. 21-ranked Texas Tech tomorrow (3 p.m.) and Oklahoma on Sunday (10:30 a.m.) as part of the Shriners Children’s College Showdown at Globe Life Field, home of the World Series champion Texas Rangers.

Before the Huskers get things underway, be sure to check out the opening series preview with matchup notes, stats and numbers to know, players to watch and more.

In addition to our “facts-and-stats” preview, you can read up more below on Will Bolt’s crew as the Husker head coach met with the media earlier in the week. Bolt talked about the Huskers’ starting pitching rotation, replacing stars Brice Matthews and Max Anderson, Nebraska’s 2024 season outlook and more.

Below is a rundown of everything Bolt said ahead of the three-game weekend.

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Overall, Bolt says the health of the roster is looking “great” but that both freshman right-handed pitcher Noah Madsen and junior infielder Aaron Manias both have undergone season-ending surgery.

Bolt: “Those two guys will be medically exempt from the roster, and it’s unfortunate that they won’t be able to compete this year. But other than that, we seem to be in pretty good shape.”

Nebraska will be trotting out RHP Brett Sears (Friday vs. Baylor), LHP Will Walsh (Saturday vs. TTU) and LHP Caleb Clark (Sunday vs. Oklahoma) this weekend.

Why and how did Bolt settle on that trio?

BRETT SEARS:

“Sears was a little up and down this fall as far as his health, and he’s 100 percent healthy (now) and feeling great. He’s been really, really good this spring. Obviously dating back to last summer, he’s a guy coming back we felt would be a really good candidate to start. He’s got four pitches he can throw for a strike, his stuff’s been good, really competitive on attack. I felt like he was a guy to go to right out of the chute.”

WILL WALSH:

“Walsh has the most experience returning in the rotation. He’s been really good this spring. Felt like we did like that matchup on Saturday.”

CALEB CLARK:

“Clark, again another guy with experience. He’s been really good. Stuff’s up a little bit from last year. Last year, probably went to battle with one-and-a-half pitches. Right now, he’s got three true pitches he’s throwing. So feel good there.”

DREW CHRISTO:

“Drew is certainly in that mix as well. He hasn’t felt great. He’s not injured. But his stuff wasn’t quite where he wanted it to be and where we wanted it to be. His last outing he was really good, but don’t feel like he’s built up quite yet to start. I would expect him to be available out of the bullpen later this weekend.”

“I think it’s close enough to where this decision was made just recently. We went all the way down to the wire. They’re also close enough to where, there’s a guy you could plug in if you felt like it was a better matchup the next weekend, I think, even from that standpoint. So we’ll just kind of see how it plays out with the staff.

“But I would anticipate the guys that we’re gonna go out there this weekend, we’re gonna throw the ball over the plate. And that’s gonna be the biggest key is just navigating the game, controlling the running game, fielding your position and then throwing strikes to get us to the pen because, just on paper, I think the pen is probably the strength of the pitching staff.”

“I think there’s some young guys in there. I think (Tucker) Timmerman is a guy that’s gonna get the ball pretty quickly. He’s probably been the most dominant arm we’ve had this spring, and if we have the luxury of keeping him in the pen, that would be great bringing him along as a freshman and his mentality that he brings. He’s on attack. I mean, he’s growling out there. And so we’d like to be able to keep him in that role. Ty Horn’s another freshman I think you’re gonna see, probably pretty early, out of the bullpen. Both those guys could start.

“And then there’s the back-end guys that we’ve talked about, too. Casey Daiss … he’s gonna close for us. You also got (Evan) Borst, (Kyle) Perry, Rans Sanders, Kyle Froehlich. A lot of those guys have saved games before as well. So, like I said, if we can get off to a good start, avoid the crooked numbers early, we’ve got some guys we feel like we can hand it off to that have fulfill those roles at this level.”

“I think you’ll see a combination of (Case) Sanderson, the freshman, over there. He’s been really consistent since he’s been here. Left-handed hitter, left-handed thrower. Haven’t had many of those guys through the years at first base. They’re kind of a luxury to have. Tyler Stone is another. I think you’ll probably see both those guys in the lineup more often than not – two left-handed hitters (Stone throws right-handed). And Stone, in particular, has been pretty impressive. He’s a guy that moves around really well for his size and does a nice job over there.”

“Josh Overbeek has gotten the majority of the reps there. Switch hitter, physical, 6-foot-2, 220 pounds, looks the part, vocal leader for us even as a new guy. Hard-nosed player. He’s just a guy that, if you asked probably anybody on our team, who the hardest worker is on our team, Overbeek’s name comes up as much as anybody. A couple other guys in the mix there, but Overbeek has kind of established himself there.”

In 2022, the Huskers had a three-game nonconference road series against No. 17 TCU at Globe Life Field.

Nebraska got swept, losing all three games after falling behind early and trailing by exactly four runs after the fifth inning in all three. The Huskers battled late in two of those matchups, bringing the go-ahead run to the plate in the eighth inning or later in both but ultimately left winless.

Despite an 0-3 showing, though, perhaps there are some built-in advantages for the Huskers after having gotten that experience playing at the MLB ballpark?

“Seems pretty fast out there. So (knowing) we have to have outfielders that can run. It’ll be different this time around. And last time we were there, we didn’t necessarily cover a lot of ground in the outfield. That’s kind of the main thing that sticks out.

“Obviously, it’s a dirt-with-turf combo. Now, some guys may want to use mold (cleats) that play in the outfield. So just stuff like that, nothing crazy. Obviously, it’s a really neat experience for our guys playing in a big league ballpark, the lighting’s great, and we’re looking forward to playing a couple of early morning games.”

“We have leaders. We have some guys that (emerged). Don’t know that we’re actually gonna make an announcement or anything as far as who the captains are. But I think we’ve had some guys emerge, and we’re gonna kind of see how that plays out.”

“Well, again, I don’t know that you’ll really know until the season starts. I mean, it’s easy to be vocal when your name’s getting written in the lineup every day and you have a 0.00 ERA. It’s easy to be vocal and care tremendously about the team. So we’ll see. We’ll see how guys respond to that.

“Obviously, KP (Perry) is a guy who’s been a captain before, and he’s kind of learned the ins and outs of being a leader. And some of the other guys have emerged, too. I mean, (Garrett) Anglim and Cole Evans are guys that have showed up since school started, and they’ve been nothing but (consistent). It reminds me a lot of the veteran outfielders we had in ‘21. (Joe) Acker, (Mojo) Hagge), Logan Foster, Jaxon Hallmark. Some of those guys who were just really sold out to the team. So I think we’ve got some really good leaders. Whether we put a label on them or not, we’ll see. I’m kind of keeping an open mind as far as how we’re gonna do that this year.”

“I think so. That’s something we talk about just about every year – wanting to get more left-handed hitters in there. I just think it makes such a big difference for a pitcher to have to take a look at two different (hitters) – a righty and a lefty – up and down the lineup because they can’t get in a groove, and they can’t start having the same sequences. And some right-handed pitchers don’t like the space with a left-handed hitter up there. So they may miss, and it takes them a while to get it back.

“But you’ve gotta have quality, that’s the thing. And I’m very rarely ever going to sacrifice defense for offense. So you’ve got to be really, really good with a bat to do that. So I think we’ve got some left-handed hitters this year. I think we’ll probably start four or five of them on most days against righties.”

“Yeah, I do. And, again, I think these are all things that we can sit here and talk about before the season starts like ‘Oh, chemistry is great. Cohesion is great. Everybody’s (feeling good).’ I think it’s great. But, again, we’ll see once we start playing real games, and then you’ll get a real sense for how team oriented everybody is. I feel great about it right now, I will admit.

“We have a lot of guys that fit the mold of the type of player we’re looking for in terms of mentality. They talk about winning a lot, which that’s (great to hear). Why else are we here, you know? We’re here to win. We’re here to play in the postseason. We’re here to host games that mean something here in this ballpark (Haymarket Park) late in the season, to play in front of our fans. Those are the things they’ve been about, they’ve talked about, and maybe more so than the past couple years where that hasn’t necessarily been what everybody’s message has been. (This year), it’s ‘We’re here to do something about the sour taste of not getting in the postseason.’”

“Well, I’m not real comfortable replacing two guys that hit 40 home runs. But I said it earlier: We’re not gonna say ‘Hey, OK, these two guys are gone. These two guys step up to replace them.’ I mean, it would be great to think that that would happen, but there’s a reason that those two guys are, some of the best in school history. It doesn’t come around very often. So you’re looking at more of a team-wide approach as to how we’re going to replace that production.

“Are we gonna hit 100 home runs? I don’t really care. As long as we score runs. We’re gonna have to find a way to get on base. I feel like we’ve got some high on-base, low-strikeout guys on this team. We’ve got a little more team speed, and then we have some guys I think are gonna emerge as more power hitters than what they’ve maybe previously shown. So, not real comfortable replacing those guys, but I am comfortable knowing that we have a lot of guys that are willing to fulfill a role for the team.”