OMAHA, Neb. — Maryland hit two home runs in the eighth inning Wednesday to break a 1-1 tie and beat the No. 20 Illinois baseball team 6-2 in the Big Ten Tournament's first round at TD Ameritrade Park. Illinois drops to Thursday's losers' bracket game at 9 a.m. CT against Michigan.
"We got outplayed in every aspect," said head coach Dan Hartleb. "Their starting pitcher did an outstanding job against us. We gave up the big inning and you just can't do that in tournament play."
Illinois (36-18) has a long road back in the tournament bracket, having to win four straight games in three days to get to Sunday's championship. Illinois would have to win Thursday at 9 a.m. CT, Friday at 3:30 p.m. CT, Saturday at 9 a.m. CT and again Saturday at 5 p.m. CT to get to the championship game Sunday at 1 p.m. CT.
"We didn't play well today but that doesn't mean we can't come back and win this thing," said Illinois junior Michael Massey, who led the Illini with two hits and had the team's only RBI.
Maryland (29-27) powered past Illinois with two-run homers from Maxwell Costes and Justin Vought in the eighth. After the Terrapins added another run in the ninth, Illinois scored a put two runners on to bring the potential tying run to the on-deck circle, but two straight punch outs ended the threat.
Andy Fisher started and turned in his fifth straight quality start for Illinois. Fisher worked 6 1/3 innings, allowing only one run on five hits and striking out four. Sean Leland (6-3) took the loss after allowing the two homers in one inning.
Hunter Parsons (10-3) was dominant for Maryland, going 7 1/3 innings and allowing one run on four hits. He threw 123 pitches to earn his 10th win of the year.
Illinois will face Michigan, which was one-hit by Ohio State in a 2-1 loss Wednesday.
Notes
• Illinois has won 14 of its last 19 games.
• Illinois is ranked No. 20 by D1Baseball, its highest ranking this season and the highest currently in the Big Ten.
• Illinois dropped to No. 24 in the RPI, still the best in the Big Ten.
• Illinois played error-free for the 14th time in the last 20 games. Illinois has only eight errors in the last 20 games.
• Illinois is tied for the national lead in fielding percentage at .983, slightly ahead of last year's single-season program record of .979. Nebraska set the Big Ten record of .981 in 2013.
• Illinois is second in the nation in fewest errors per game (0.63), behind only Navy (0.56).
• Michael Massey has only one error in his last 91 starts at second base dating back to 4/23/2017 (a dropped feed at second from shortstop on a fielder's choice at Michigan 5/13/2018).
• Andy Fisher threw his fifth straight quality start and 12th straight start allowing three or fewer runs.
• Maryland went 1-12 with runners in scoring position. Opponents are hitting .194 with runners in scoring position against Illinois this season (95-489).
• Hitting streaks: Massey 5
• Reached base streaks: Massey 22, McDonald 9, Sarver 7
