Husker batters keep on hitting in 14-3 thumping of Omaha | Baseball

The Nebraska baseball team left no doubt this time.

After three one-run games, all of which came down to the final pitch, the Huskers jumped on Omaha in the first inning and stayed hot offensively with a 14-3 win in front of 4,867 Wednesday night at Haymarket Park.

The game was called after seven innings with Nebraska leading by 11 runs. The teams agreed to a run rule during the home plate meeting with the game’s umpires prior to first pitch.

The Mavericks had won a pair of one-run games over NU on their home field this season, with the Huskers getting a walk-off, 6-5 win on March 14. But it had largely been Omaha controlling things between the teams, holding the lead or being tied with Nebraska in 24 of the 27 innings played between the squads this season.

The Mavericks (19-19) never got the chance to build a lead Wednesday.

With Nebraska down 1-0 in the bottom of the first, Cam Chick led off the inning by getting hit by a pitch for the eighth time in his last five games. A stolen base and a throwing error brought Chick home, and Max Anderson followed with a 413-foot, two-run homer to give the Huskers a lead they wouldn’t relinquish.

It was Nebraska’s third straight win, with the Huskers (17-23) scoring 41 runs over the three contests.

“They’re putting consecutive at-bats together now. They’re playing together,” NU starter Dawson McCarville said. “I feel like they’re doing the dirty work, getting hit by pitches — Cam Chick is a magnet. They’re just playing loose, having fun and playing aggressive.”

Anderson stayed hot at the plate, finishing 3-for-5 with a two-run homer. Over his last five games, Anderson is 11-for-24 (.458) with three homers and nine RBIs.

Brice Matthews had a two-run shot of his own in the fourth inning while finishing 2-for-2. The sophomore, after ending a 0-for-22 slump last Friday at Indiana, now has a five-game hitting streak and a pair of home runs of his own.

“(I’m) slowing everything down, not trying to do too much,” Matthews said. “Trusting what my coaches are telling me in the scouting reports that we have and just having fun.”

McCarville went six innings on the mound for NU, allowing three runs and scattering six hits, and just as importantly saving Nebraska’s bullpen for this weekend’s series against Iowa that begins Friday night.

The outing tied McCarville’s longest of the season, first set March 15 against New Mexico State. He had only pitched into the sixth inning once in five starts since that New Mexico State game before Wednesday night.

“He’s had a couple of really, really dynamic outings, and he’s had some outings where he’s just kind of had to grind through it and he’s felt for it a little bit,” NU coach Will Bolt said. “I didn’t feel like he was feeling for it tonight. I thought he was kind of determined to go out there and make a statement.”

Nebraska blew the game open with a six-run third inning that included five hits, a wild pitch and an Omaha error. Garrett Anglim, Core Jackson and Josh Caron each delivered RBIs in the frame.