IOWA CITY, Iowa – The University of Iowa baseball team defeated Milwaukee, 12-6, on Tuesday night at Duane Banks Field.
“We had a hard time finishing guys off tonight,” said head coach Rick Heller. “Milwaukee battled hard, and it wasn’t as clean as you would like. Way too many free bases, it seemed like every guy we brought in at least had one. But we ended up avoiding the big inning which was the key tonight.”
The Panthers struck first plating an unearned run in the first, but the Hawkeyes responded with a four-run bottom half. The teams traded runs in the second before Iowa plated two in the third.
Milwaukee added a run in the fourth and one in the seventh. Iowa plated a pair of runs after the seventh inning stretch, but the Panthers would not go away scoring two in the top of the eighth. A three-run home run from Blake Guerin put the game out of reach in the bottom of the eighth.
Aaron Savary got the start for Iowa in a bullpen game for the Hawkeyes. He earned the win throwing one inning allowing one run on one hit.
Nine Hawkeyes threw in the contest for Iowa. Ben DeTaeye had the longest outing throwing the final 1 1/3 innings of the contest to earn his third save of the year.
The Hawkeye pitchers struck out nine Panthers and allowed six runs (three earned) on 11 hits.
Seven Iowa batters tallied a hit in the midweek game. Guerin led the way with three RBIs followed by Michael Seegers and Gable Mitchell each with two. Sam Petersen and Kyle Huckstorf each scored three runs for the Hawkeyes.
“Yeah, we got the win,” said Heller. “We did what we had to do, but it wasn’t a great game. It wasn’t a clean game. It was messy on the mound, it was messy defensively, and three of the eight innings weren’t very productive offensively. We need to be better than that, and hold ourselves to a higher standard.”
Iowa returns to action on the road at Nebraska for a three-game series on April 26-28.