By ISU Athletics Media Relations
PORT CHARLOTTE, Fla. – The Illinois State baseball team surrendered a season-high 15 runs in a shutout loss to Michigan State Tuesday at the Snowbird Classic, as the Spartans earned a 15-0 win over the Redbirds.
Illinois State (4-7) was limited to just one hit in the contest, while Michigan State (9-1) piled up 19 hits against five Redbird pitchers.
Spartan starter Andrew Gonzalez allowed just one hit – a fourth-inning double to Jared Hendren – over seven shutout innings of work. Three Michigan State relievers combined on two scoreless innings to finish off the win.
“That’s just a good team. They can pitch, play good defense, and they can hit the heck out of the ball,” Illinois State head coach Bo Durkac said of Michigan State. “It was just a tough day for the Redbirds.”
The Spartans scored one run in the top of the first inning and never looked back, after Brandon Hughes singled up the middle to score Jordan Zimmerman. Michigan State added three more runs in the third, thanks to a two-run single from Zimmerman and an Alex Troop RBI single. Three more runs in the fifth stretched the lead to 7-0, as Troop provided a two-run single before Dan Durkin plated him with a double.
Michigan State’s biggest inning was the seventh, as the Spartans crossed home plate five times. Troop got it started with an RBI single. Durkin was then hit by a pitch with the bases loaded to score the inning’s second run. Justin Hovis brought two more in on a single through the left side and Robbie Jones produced the fifth run of the inning on an RBI groundout.
The Spartans tacked on three more in the eighth. Durkin drew a bases-loaded walk before Hovis provided a sacrifice fly to plate another run. Will Salter concluded the scoring with an RBI double.
Redbird starter Jeff Lindgren allowed seven runs, five of which were earned, on 11 hits over 4.2 innings of work. Mitch Vogrin and Jack Czeszewski each pitched 1.1 innings of scoreless relief, but Redbird relievers Lucas Hall (five runs allowed) and Tyler Paulsen (three runs allowed) were hit hard in the seventh and eighth innings, respectively.
Joe Kelch and Danny Jackson drew walks for Illinois State and Brian Rodemoyer was hit by a pitch. They joined Hendren as the only Redbirds to reach base Tuesday.
Illinois State returns to action with a road game at Florida International, beginning at 2 p.m. CT, Wednesday in Miami. Play-by-play is on WJBC.com at 1:50. Links for live stats and audio can be found at GoRedbirds.com, and live updates from the game can be found on Twitter, by following @RedbirdBaseball.
