Jason Savacool saved his best outing for the most important moment.
The junior started out the season as Maryland baseball’s ace before being shuffled around as a Saturday and Sunday starter to round out the year. The right-hander struggled to the tune of a 6.26 earned run average in eight Big Ten starts.
But Savacool threw a gem in the biggest game of the campaign thus far with a trip to the Big Ten tournament title game on the line. He turned in six scoreless innings, allowing just four hits and striking out six Cornhuskers in the process. Just two days after throwing a 20-pitch relief outing in an extra-innings win, Savacool once again showed coach Rob Vaughn why he entrusted him with the top spot in his rotation before the season.
On the offensive side, Maryland put 10 hits on the board despite receiving no production from the top one-third of its order. Each hitter in the lineup four through nine chipped in with at least a hit, piecing enough together in the four-run effort.
The mixture of small ball from multiple hitters and a long ball from Eddie Hacopian, along with Savacool’s lights-out performance, kept No. 4-seed Nebraska (33-23-1,15-10 B1G) in a deep hole until late and gave No. 1-seed Maryland (40-19, 18-7) a simple formula for victory in a 4-2 victory in the semifinals of the Big Ten tournament. The Terps will move on to face No. 3-seed Iowa on Sunday in the championship game.
The Terps got the scoring started early, recording six runs and three hits in the opening three innings. All of them came in a second inning in which small ball was the primary weapon. Sophomore center fielder Elijah Lambros laid down a safety squeeze to score Hacopian from third when runners were on the corners. Sophomore left fielder Jacob Orr bunted the next at-bat to put two runners in scoring position before junior second baseman Kevin Keister scored both with a single to left field.
The bases were loaded for the Terps in the fourth inning after two singles and a walk. But junior shortstop Matt Shaw struck out and senior third baseman Nick Lorusso flew out to end the frame and strand three runners. In the fifth, Hacopian smashed a solo home run to left field for his second extra-base hit of the contest, giving the Terps a 4-0 advantage.
No more offense was needed, as neither side put up a run after the fifth frame. Savacool and fifth-year right-hander Kenny Lippman combined for eight scoreless innings and kept Nebraska without a response. But redshirt sophomore right-hander Nigel Belgrave walked the bases loaded with no outs in the ninth inning, leading to some tense moments in front of a raucous crowd at Charles Schwab Field.
Sophomore left-hander Andrew Johnson came in to try and stop the bleeding, allowing a bases-loaded single that scored a run. With the go-ahead run at the plate, Johnson threw a punchout before a sac fly scored another run for the second out. The final out came at the right field warning track, where fifth-year right fielder Matt Woods caught a ball that would’ve given Nebraska a walk-off homer.
Maryland will take on Iowa Sunday afternoon, searching for its first tournament title since joining the Big Ten in the 2015 season.
