3/9/2022 baseball Edit

Hoosiers' pitching depth trending upward

Keegan Nickoson • TheHoosier

Staff Writer

In my senior year at Indiana studying Sports Media and Sports Journalism. I live for the most outlandish takes on the IU boards. Fat Dan's has the best food in Bloomington.

Don't miss out on any of our exclusive football, basketball and recruiting coverage. Sign up with TheHoosier.com here.

On Tuesday afternoon, Jeff Mercer and the Hoosiers hosted a red hot Cincinnati team. The Bearcats (6-5) averaged seven runs a game coming into yesterday's contest; the Bearcats made a statement with a win over Ohio State last Wednesday and a series win over Northwestern soon after.

Scott Googins' squad represented a tough matchup for the Hoosiers, coming off a series win at Missouri State.

Freshman starter Luke Hayden made his second start of the season. Hayden, who was snakebitten by the walk his last time out, pitched with a completely different attitude on Tuesday.

"As you see, as those guys get an opportunity to pitch, and as Coach Glant coming from professional ball gets a chance to work with those guys and get comfortable," said Indiana Head Coach Jeff Mercer. "That's why I never was concerned early; you just have to work through the kinks."

Hayden wouldn't walk a single batter, and if it weren't for a thirty-minute hiatus in between the first and second inning, the Bloomington native most likely would have been able to strike out more than the four batters he struck out and throw more than the three innings he did throw. Still, an excellent outing from the freshman.

Sophomore right-hander Nathan Stahl would relieve Hayden in the 4th inning, and he'll tell you the three innings he pitched felt like a load off his shoulders.

"It felt great, after the last couple weeks, just struggling a little bit. Just going out there being free, being loose. It felt really good to go out there and dominate," Stahl said.

Tuesday's outing for the Sophomore was his best of the three he's made this season. A tough 8 earned runs over four total innings against Clemson and Arkansas had Stahl off to a slow start. Hopefully, Wednesday can be a refresher for the remainder of his 2022 campaign.

"The ability to land offspeed pitches in fastball counts really threw them off a bit. I think they're a really good fastball hitting team, we were able to keep them off-balance," Stahl said.

These midweek non-conference games are always challenging for coaches. You usually aren't using your best arms, and even further than that, usually freshman. These outings for youngsters are huge for development and, even more significant, to show the potential of a team's depth within their pitching staff.

"That's the importance of getting young guys on the mound in a midweek, getting those guys comfortable and being able to use them. . . I do think our bullpen will be a strength, again, as it was last year," Mercer said.