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Thursday, May 9, 2019
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
SPORTS

Michigan pulls away late from Spartans to win midweek game

The seventh inning turned the 
tide for Michigan.
After barely surviving the top of 
the inning with the bases loaded 
and only one out, the Wolverines’ 
offense came to life — capitalizing 
on a throwing error, a hit-by-pitch 
and a wild pitch. The game was 
put out of reach for in-state rival 
Michigan State (16-30 overall, 5-12 
Big Ten) as it went down 5-0 to the 
hosts at Ray Fisher Stadium.
In their third meeting on the 
season, the Michigan baseball 
team (35-11, 14-3) bested the 
Spartans 7-0 after pulling away 
late.
For the Wolverines, every hit 
mattered. A leadoff fly ball from 
sophomore 
designated 
hitter 
Jordan Nwogu bounced off the top 
of the wall in right field, forcing 
the right fielder to scramble after 
the ball to limit Nwogu to a triple. 
Sophomore center fielder Jesse 
Franklin then hit a sacrifice fly to 

bring in Nwogu for an early 1-0 
lead.
Two innings later, Franklin 
would strike again. This time with 
a 105-mile-per-hour bullet over 
the scoreboard in right field for a 
solo home run and a 2-0 lead for 
Michigan.
“Guys 
getting 
on 
base,” 
said 
Franklin. 
“Those 
sac-flies, I wasn’t 
really trying to hit 
pop ups like that 
because if nobody’s 
on base those are 
just big old pop 
flies. So just guys 
getting on base.”
Added Michigan 
coach Erik Bakich: 
“We took advantage of some 
opportunistic offense. We did a 
good job when we got runners to 
third base to get them in somehow, 
even if it wasn’t via a Franklin 
home run or sac fly, but just to find 
a way to knock those guys in.”
All told, the Wolverines scored 
seven runs on eight hits, balancing 

powerful batting with capitalizing 
on Michigan State’s mistakes.
Both 
teams 
had 
managed 
to find a way to shut down the 
opposing team’s offense until the 
seventh inning, when senior left-
hander Ben Keizer was in his third 
inning 
of 
relief. 
Zaid 
Walker 
managed a single, 
and pinch hitter 
Bailey 
Peterson 
reached base after 
a backhanded toss 
from 
sophomore 
shortstop 
Jack 
Blomgren 
drew 
senior 
second 
baseman 
Ako 
Thomas 
off 
the 
base.
Keizer was pulled before the 
inning ended and sophomore left-
hander Angelo Smith came in to 
get out of the jam. After giving up 
a four pitch walk to load the bases, 
Smith struck out the Spartan’s 
leadoff hitter. But the inning ended 
when a hard-hit ball to right field 
forced a diving catch from junior 

right fielder Jordan Brewer.
Michigan went on to score three 
runs in the bottom of the seventh 
and two runs in the bottom of the 
eighth to win the game 7-0.
“I walked the first guy,” Smith 
said. “From there I had to find it 
quick because the game’s getting 
close and if they score they’d only 
be down one so the next batter I 
threw three sliders and got him out 

in three pitches.”
Added 
Bakich: 
“All 
the 
momentum from then was on our 
side, we scored five runs in the 
next two innings after that. That 
was a huge moment in the game, 
if he dives and misses it, all three 
runs score. So, he took a chance 
and nailed it and got it. From that 
moment on you could just feel it 
was different.”

KENT SCHWARTZ
Daily Sports Writer

Men’s tennis bows out in second round of NCAA Tournament

For the seniors of the Michigan 
men’s 
tennis 
team, 
Saturday 
brought two endings.
Though 
Myles 
Schalet 
and 
Gabe 
Tishman 
missed 
commencement while in Waco, 
Texas for the NCAA Tournament, 
they still posed in caps and gowns 
to celebrate the culmination of 
their time as students.
A few hours later, their time 
as college athletes, too, came 
to an end. A day after beating 
Dartmouth (15-9), 4-2, on Friday, 
the 
20th-ranked 
Wolverines 
(18-9) fell to No. 6 Baylor (24-5), 
4-1, in the second round of the 
tournament.
Michigan started slow against 
the Big Green, losing its two 
completed 
doubles 
matches 
to drop the doubles point. But 
sophomore Mattias Siimar won at 
No. 3 singles in straight sets, 6-3, 
6-1, to tie the score.
“Mattias getting on the board 
for us was huge,” said Michigan 
coach Adam Steinberg. “He’s 
struggled a little bit as of late, 

so I was happy for him. When 
you lose the doubles point, it’s 
so important to get to one-all 
and you feel like, OK, back in the 
match.”
After Dartmouth regained the 
lead with a win at No. 4 singles, 
it seemed like the Wolverines 
were in trouble when freshman 
Patrick Maloney fell behind, 3-0, 
in his second set at the No. 5 slot. 
But Maloney battled back to win 
in straight sets, 7-5, 6-3, knotting 
the match back up. That provided 
the spark Michigan needed, as it 

took the matches at No. 2 and No. 
6 singles to seal the win — and 
the all-important second-round 
berth.
But if Friday’s matches started 
with a whimper and ended with 
a bang, Saturday’s were the 
opposite.
Facing the Bears as a significant 
underdog in the round of 32, the 
Wolverines dropped their match 
at No. 1 doubles before roaring 
back to take the remaining two, 
both in tiebreakers. Schalet and 
freshman Andrew Fenty jumped 

up and down and whooped as 
they clinched the doubles point 
that had eluded Michigan the day 
before.
“It was an exciting doubles 
point,” Steinberg said. “It was 
great. It doesn’t get much better 
than that for college tennis. We 
came through and we felt great 
about it going into the singles, so 
it’s a — against a team like Baylor, 
if you don’t win the doubles, 
you’re really in trouble.”
As the Wolverines learned, 
sometimes, against a team like 
Baylor, you’re in trouble anyway.
This time, the Bears were 
the team that got the score to 
one-all after losing the doubles 
point and simultaneously swung 
momentum in their favor. First, it 
was junior Connor Johnston who 
went down in straight sets, 2-6, 
3-6. The carnage only piled up as 
Fenty, then Tishman, then Siimar 
dropped their matches — all in 
straight sets.
Michigan won just two sets at 
singles — one each from Maloney 
and Schalet, both of whom were 
not afforded the chance to finish 
their matches with the result 
already decided.

“Our energy in the beginning 
of the singles needed to be much 
better,” Steinberg said. “For us, 
that’s who we are, our identity, 
and I don’t think we came out the 
way we should have and Baylor 
fed off that. They got confident 
quick and they have great players, 
so you give a little confidence 
to a team like that, with a lot of 
talent, they’re gonna take it and 
run with it. ... When you win the 
doubles, you gotta capitalize on 
it early, get some breaks, and we 
didn’t do that. And Baylor took 
control of the match.”
Fenty, ranked No. 48 in the 
country 
at 
singles, 
qualified 
for 
the 
NCAA 
Individual 
Championships later this month, 
the lone Wolverine who will 
keep playing after the team’s 
elimination.
Steinberg 
always 
tells 
his 
tournament teams that these are 
the moments they’ve worked for 
all year — the opportunity to play 
great teams like the Bears on the 
biggest stage in college tennis. 
But 
on 
Saturday, 
Michigan 
couldn’t take advantage of that 
opportunity, 
and 
its 
season 
unceremoniously came to a close.

ARIA GERSON
Daily Sports Editor

KATELYN MULCAHY/Daily
Sophomore left-hander Angelo Smith escaped a seventh-inning jam Tuesday.

All the 
momentum 
from then was 
on our side

ALEC COHEN/Daily
Senior Myles Schalet recorded one of Michigan’s two singles victories Baylor.

